Harry Potters wacky life
by crocket
Summary: This a repost first chapter was beta read by Gatonio, So big thanks to him. Thanks to Lanie McCoy for her beta work on the other chapters. Harry has a nervous breakdown and this is the fallout from that.
1. Chapter 1

**I don't own Harry Potter or any of the characters. In fact I am not even sure it is me writing this; I think I lent my PC to some one the day this was written. Please enjoy. **

**Chapter One **

**Harry Potter's Weird Day**

Harry Potter's day wasn't the best yet, well, when ever did he have a best day? The day he learnt he was a wizard he was over the moon but what followed was attacks on his person and his integrity. So a few days in a cupboard or a psycho nut and his bunch trying to kill you was a no brainer really. Or maybe a few days of no food compared to Snape another no brainer.

As if that wasn't enough he finds out that Dumbledore is a liar, an ingrate and incompetent to boot. He sat up, his head whirling with thoughts. Dumbledore had put him there, in fact, he left him on a door step and never spoke to the Dursleys; now what sort of moron would do that? Then in all the time he had been there, never once had Dumbledore made a visit, sent a birthday card, a Christmas present and yet Fumbledore had the gall to say that he was Harry's guardian.

"Boy get down here!" shouted the overblown windbag known as Vernon Dursley.

Well he had been home for five minutes so he was happy at least to get his stuff put away and Hedwig out. He got up and went out the door or tried to.

"BOY GET YOUR SCRAWNY WORTHESS BODY DOWN HERE NOW!" shouted Vernon.

"How can I Uncle Vernon when either you, Dudley or Aunt Petunia have locked me in my room?" Then Harry smiled "I know! I can just use some…"

"WAIT DONT YOU DARE YOU FREAK! IF YOU…"

Silence Harry grabbed his wand and stared at the door. After ten minutes still nothing. He was deciding whether to use magic or not when he heard a siren then another. Now he was worried. Hearing some loud voices and seeing the firemen and ambulance services outside, he smiled and shouted,

"WHATS GOING ON? WHY WON'T ANYONE ANSWER ME?"

A few seconds later he shouted again, "HELLO IS THERE ANYONE THERE?"

A voice on the other side off the door answered "Huh… Hello anyone in there?"

Harry smiled again, a truly Snape type smile, "Y-ye-ye-yes", he stammered, "are you the ones who bought me for this week? You have to ask my master: the great and all-powerful Vernon if you want the keys. He should be back sometime in the next few days."

"What you mean the next few days?" The voice responded with a hint of worry.

"Well he hasn't fed me in a while so he will be back soon, as he is a good master and wouldn't let me starve to death. I maybe a useless freak, but he says I can still make him money". Harry smiled wider at his own ingenuity.

Within minutes, the door was smashed of its hinges as two very big and very annoyed looking coppers stared at the bare empty room, one bed if it could be called that, one stool and bars on the window. A small boy cowering in the corner hitting himself repeating "Bad Harry! Bad Harry! Shouldn't speak unless spoken to, Bad Harry."

He had to do it in the corner so no one could see him smiling and trying not to laugh. A strong arm reached out and touched his shoulder he didn't act when he suddenly froze and went rigid. The officer had seen abuse cases before, he mightn't thought the 'Bad Harry' was pretending but with the door locked, bolted and padlocked on the outside he wasn't sure. However that one touch told him everything; this was truly a scared child. He withdrew his hand fast and stepped away. He knew he was large and intimidating but like many large people he was gentle and had a heart of gold.

"Harry, Vernon is in hospital he has had a stroke, his wife and son are with him. We only stayed here to make sure they weren't burgled or worse until someone came and locked the door." The officer said as calmly as he could manage.

"My door" said a quiet voice, "Will I get in trouble as my door broken?"

That was it! The second officer who had remained quiet left the room and spoke into his mike,

"Seria One, can you get child services here along with an abuse counselor and maybe a female officer please?" He looked into the room and was about to step away when he noticed the door, a cat flap, why the hell did he have a cat flap?

"Harry, you might have to leave here for a while, do you want me to find your cat for you?" He asked kindly, hoping something familiar to the child may help keep him calm during the ensuing debacle.

Harry looked up with an expression of true puzzlement, "What cat sir? The master would never allow me a cat."

The two officers looked at the cat flap then the young child in front of them, "Harry why do you have a cat flap on the door?" The first officer asked not wanting to believe the reason he was thinking.

The boy looked at them and said in a quiet tone "Its where my food comes through, I have the same in my cupboard."

"YOUR CUPBOARD!" The two officers roared.

Harry, not only honestly flinched but also shrank in on himself, as together they sounded like Vernon and years of abuse and shouting had conditioned this reaction

"WHAT CUBOARD COULD THEY-" His partner's hand stopped him and he saw the effect they had on the small child in front of them.

"Under the stairs," a small voice said followed by a sob and the shaking of the shoulders, "under the stairs, please don't put me there any more, please I like my new room, please…"

The two officers didn't know it, but in Harry's head he was now a small child being punished for looking at Dudley toys in a freaky manner. Harry Potter, the boy-who-lived, had snapped, gone nuts, cracked up, was no longer playing with a full deck. His eyes saw nothing and his mind refused everything.

The two officers watched as a small badly dressed child descended into madness all they heard him repeat was "no not the cupboard! I be good, I try not take so long cooking breakfast, I sorry" and the most heart rending, "I want to die! Why mummy and daddy die? Couldn't I been in the car and died with them even if we all went to hell it be better than this".

After his 7th or 8th repetition the two officers were at a loss, one went down with tears in his eyes and looked under the stairs. A none-too-special cupboard was there, unless you counted the padlocks and the cat flap. He put on a pair of gloves and opened the door to reveal a small space inside, a basket, a few torn threadbare child blankets and scratches to high to be from an animal.

Then he felt sick for in the scratches were bits of nail, human fingernail. A rage so all consuming so total hit him that he knew if any Dursley entered this house they would need another ambulance to get out of the street. A women's voice slowly filter through, he looked at her and pointed upstairs.

As she went upstairs, she was heard screaming "THE FUCKING BASTARDS DID WHAT TO HIM? A FUCKING CUBOARD!"

The social worker looked up and saw Barry, "bad as it is", he said, "he called Vernon Dursley 'master' and then went near catatonic when Chris touched him and to make it worse they had him padlocked into the room."

The woman blinked with increasing comprehension, "What about downstairs, the cupboard?"

Barry looked at her and told her what the young child had said before he went mad.

She looked at him and asked what he meant about 'mad' then she saw it. At first she thought it was a pile of old clothes or laundry, before it started to move. Her throat constricted as the pile spoke over and over again repeating the same phrases over and over again.

She looked at Barry, "How old you think?"

Before he could answer a voice cut threw and shouted. The owner of the voice wanted to know what was going on and were the Dursleys, the voice then made a mega huge mistake and proudly announced that she was Vernon's sister Marge.

Whoever she was speaking to was quiet and then she said something she would soon come to regret, "I bet it's that bloody freak boy, isn't it? I bet he has been nothing but trouble again. Did you know I had to have my poor pooch given shots after my little baby bit him for his impertinence thinking he could speak with his betters?"

Almost as soon as it was out her mouth she realized she had just confessed to allowing her dog bite a child. He might be a freak and a waster, but the police didn't know that. Before their shocked faces could fully register what she had said she decided to explain it to them.

"When its parents died in a drunken car crash, my poor brother had to take him in even though it was from a freak family and he had his own precious Duddykins to look after and how do you think that freak repaid him? HE wouldn't cook the meals right, he always complained he was hungry, but a few days in the cupboard stopped that. Then when he went to St. Brutus School for the Criminally Insane I hoped they kept him, bloody freak ruining all our lives!"

The coppers, the social worker and Arabella Figg who had come to make sure Harry was OK stared at her in shock. Marge Dursley was in handcuffs and in a squad car before she knew it, a red hand print from WPC Bakers was showing up nicely. Mrs. Figg ran to her house and flooed Albus. Unfortunately for the Dursley's, Albus was with Arthur and Molly Weasley and the two newest order members Fred and George.

Molly exploded and Arthur went red and nearly exploded as well. The twins looked up and something no one ever wanted to see was in their eyes, the fire of retribution burnt hot. As one they stood and made their way out of the room. Albus looked shocked and noticing them leaving, asked where they were going?

"WE think the death nibblers should meet the Dursleys. We told you they kept him locked in a room! We told you he had bars on his window! You told us you would sort it out!"

Albus paled as Molly and Arthur looked at him and a shout from Mrs Figg didn't do any good to calm him. The twins started to walk away when Albus said what in hindsight was a very, very stupid thing, "Don't! I am sure it is just a misunderstanding, we best get the muggles obliviated so we can sort this mess out."

Albus Dumbledore might have been fast, powerful and all that but compared to an enraged Molly, Arthur, Fred and George he was nothing. None could say what he was hit with, but when Minerva found an animal of unknown origin at her door her first thought was to capture or kill it that's when it spoke the immortal words "stop! its me Albus, I might be in a spot of trouble."

She blacked out.

At Number Four Privet Drive, Harry was still curled up and talking to himself lost in his own head. The social worker and WPC looked at the small bundle and with tears in their eyes, tried to get him to talk to them. It was during this attempt that the social worker gently tried to look at the boy's face and nearly passed out from shock. Their before her was none other than Harry Potter. She hadn't realized she had spoken aloud till the WPC asked, "You know him?"

Years of training, long forgotten resurfaced with an invigorated force, "No I knew James Potter, his father, and had a passing acquaintance with his mum, Lily." She said sadly, comprehending the full implications of this recent discovery.

"Potter Potter Potter… Where do I know that name from?"

Barry had a look of concentration on his face, "Sirius Black, the escaped felon, wasn't he implicated in the murder of a couple called Potter?"

The social worker looked up and confirmed his suspicions.

"But he said they died in a car crash when drunk!"

The social worker flew off her handle at that, "A CAR CRASH! A CAR CRASH! JAMES POTTER COULD BE A DEVIL BUT LILY WAS NOT A DRINKER!" She took a couple of calming breaths, "Who told you that?"

Barry pointed to Harry, a bit scared by the woman's rage though he would never admit to it, "Its what they told him".

For the first time in her life, she was tempted to break the rule about wizards and muggles and tell these muggles about He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named and Harry's part in his downfall. A new sound started and as one they looked around.

Like Hogwarts the rumor mill had started in Privet Drive and the rumour was that:

THE FREAK AND TROUBLE MAKER HAD ATTACKED AND KILLED VERNON DURSLEY.

In a complete breach of protocol, Chris was heard telling them what an incompetent bunch of losers they were when a child was systematically abused and they never reported it and on top of that, the fact the child was only 8/9 made it a whole lot worse.

"BUT BUT HARRY'S 13 NOT 8/9" someone shouted.

At this comment the door, the size of the child, all rolled into one thing: a long, long, long prison time for the Dursley's and Harry Potter needed to get away from this place.

Meanwhile at Hogwarts, Minerva stirred and looked around "sorry Minnie, I guess it was a shock."

She looked around the room and there were Filius and Snape trying to undo the spells with Poppy helping.

"What happened to you? How? Why? When?"

Albus would have tried to laugh but Snape cut in "Potter", his voiced dripped with sarcasm, "has decided he not only needs all the wizards' attention but also the muggles' and is probably, as we speak, lapping it all up."

Minerva tried to sit up but Poppy spotted her and made her lie back down. With a smile she said how she was sure Harry did not mind her in his bed and then laughed at her friend's red face and spluttering.

Harry lost in his own mind never noticed being moved. They had to sedate him so they could get his clothes of. The fact they all said Dudley Dursley inside the hem and all were to big didn't go amiss. As Harry stayed in his catatonic state, the police, social workers and others were trying to help him. When an investigation showed Vernon was getting £1,000 a month for Harry's first 10 years and from his 11th birthday onwards was getting £4,000 a month for his care made more than a few very unhappy .The fact this money had paid of the Dursley's mortgage made them a tad upset if the word tad meant more than half wanted to visit Vernon and give him a night stick enema.

The fact that the school St. Brutus' didn't exist anywhere in England, Wales or Scotland was also not unnoticed. When Barry's and Chris' report was read and Harry's words were "you my new owners?" were clearly mentioned, it was definitely taken into account. The fact that no Harry Potter was in any Education system past his 11th birthday wouldn't be good for the Dursley's either. They were going to jail.

The social workers were also not too happy and were investigating all the children in the area when many come forward about Dudley and his gang. Things for the Dursley's looked worse. Had the wizards and witches been idle in all this time, no, they hadn't, Albus had more howlers from Order Members than all the howlers the school had in the last 12 years. The fact that Harry was Missing didn't help either.

Even Dobby couldn't find him and as news come out about Harry's abuse, Albus became really scared, more scared than worried as many noticed. "Albus? Albus? ALBUS!", as he looked around, he noticed Minnie looking at him. The article in The Quibbler didn't match what Albus had said, the fact it matched more what the Weasley family said was even more alarming.

"Sorry Minnie, I am worried about Harry."

For the first time in her life she was gob-smacked when a normally oily snide voice spoke up, "Worried or scared headmaster? If he is dead you know what that means…"

Albus went white and Minnie said the most obvious thing "YOU'RE NOT BLOODY WORRIED BECAUSE YOU PUT HARRY POTTER, THE BOY-WHO-LIVED IN AN ABUSIVE HOUSEHOLD AFTER IGNORING MY ADVICE? ARE YOU SO BLOODY VAIN AS TO THINK YOUR REPUTATION IS MORE IMPORTANT THAN A CHILDS LIFE!" As she took a breath, she was seething.

"NO THE FACT THAT PROPHECY PUTS HARRY VERSES VOLDEMORT SCARES HIM AND ME!" Answered Snape in frustration.

Minerva turned to Snape and said in a tone that would make liquid nitrogen seem a scolding hot substance "what?"

All of a sudden, the last few years rearranged themselves in her head, "A FUCKING WEAPON! A FUCKING WEAPON! YOU CHOSE TO USE ONE OF MY STUDENTS AS A WEAPON!"

A loud _thud_ was heard as she punched Albus Dumbledore in the face breaking his nose and knocking him off his chair. Then in a move that was nearly too fast to follow, she had Snape against the wall and a dirk at his throat, "tell me everything! Tell me why I was told to ignore Harry and his friends when he mentioned the Philosopher's Stone? Tell me about how I find that a detection ward for animagus is missing in the school wards? Tell me how come you pick on Harry so much? Or tell me your next of kin."

Albus moved to stop her but a normally chirpy and happy voice said "Seven times world dueling champ versus the defeater of Grindewald, wonder who would win?"

The normally small, happy Head of Ravenclaw had his wand out, a look of sheer hatred and anger on his face, as if he had added two and two together all his life to make six and now knew it was four.

"Minnie I have your back, he moves he is going down HARD."

Minerva turned to Snape and never noticed the puddle forming at Snape's shoes "Tell me everything now!"

After he told her what the prophecy was and who had told Voldemort the prophecy in the first place, he told her who it was told to and who had made it. Only Poppy's professional codes of ethics saved him and Dumbledore from death as both Minerva McGonagall and Filius Flitwick snapped and both cut the people in front of them one with a 6-inch dirk and the other with a cutting curse.

Now more than any time before, Flitwick and McGonagall felt a shame so bad, it made them retch. Not for the violence they had done, but for what they had done to one Harry Potter on the orders of the Headmaster. Poppy could barely help them and was more tempted to let them die than she would admit, but after joking to Minnie about her being in Harry's bed and the fact that it was because of the Leader-of-the-Light, the Defeater-of-Grindelwald that the child had spent so much time in bed. To find out it wasn't as she suspected, Potter and company just getting into loads of scrapes with over inquisitive urges, but the Headmaster leading them into fight against He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named sent her to near apoplexy. But all this was immaterial. Harry was missing, maybe dead. After she made sure they were comfy, she went to her office and got roaring drunk, unwittingly following Minnie and Filius into a drunken stupor.

Oblivious to all these happenings, Harry Potter was in his own little world.

"Any change?" Asked a small female voice near to tears.

The head nurse looked at the social worker and shook her head, "Your really involved in this one aren't you?"

The social worker looked at her and nodded, "I went to school with his parents and also his parents' murderer."

She shook her self and told the duty nurse to phone her when he came around. She was taking herself off the case so she could try and petition for adoption if no one came forward. As she headed home the social worker had tears coming down her face, her husband, when he come in, didn't smile, he went to her and wrapped his arms around her.

"No change then love?" He asked sadly.

She just shook her head into his shoulder and he felt her tears dampen him through his jacket and shirt.

"What's your sister saying about it in the Wizarding world?"

He felt her stiffen, "My sister is a callous, lying, cold-hearted cow who does as she wants, I haven't told her anything."

He said nothing. He had every so often come across something of her sister's and knew it to be true, she did what she wanted and never ever thought about the consequences.

"Maybe you should talk, but not mention him in specific?"

A deep breath later and a, "Yes, I hate her and what she has become, but I think I shall have to," she got up and went to the floo.

A pinch of floo powder and a bright green fire shot up, the green eerily resembling Harry's eyes.

No, she shook herself, "Rita Skeeter's office please."


	2. Chapter 2

I do not own Harry Potter or anything of value except my brain, and that is debatable. Please read and review.

Chapter Two

Rita Skeeter's face filled the floo, her trademark glasses in place.  
"Yes, who is it, what do you want? I'm busy, I've got a dead—" She stopped abruptly. "Oh, it's you. I'm busy, what do you want?" Her sister looked at her coldly and Rita said, in a quieter voice as if she had an exclusive, "Harry Potter's missing and Dumbledore was nearly assassinated." Her sister simply shook her head.

"Rita, your mouth is moving, so it means you are lying." Rita stared at her. "It's true, everyone is looking for Potter, and Dumbledore has a new scar around his throat."

"That does not mean he was nearly assassinated. Now what do you mean,  
Potter's missing?"

Rita looked long and hard at her sister. "A month ago, all hell broke loose. At first it seemed that Potter was being looked after by muggles.  
Then it turned out they have been arrested and charged with child abuse and all sorts other of stuff. Then I found out that Dumbledore had actually put him with the muggles and not even spoke to them, just put him in a basket, left a note and went away."

"That bastard piece of shit!" She couldn't stop herself and she knew her sister would work it out fast. "I'm in social services, child welfare—I look into and after children who are abused, to think the headmaster of Hogwarts put a child on a doorstep and walked away and never checked on the child is bad. To think that Harry must be, what, 13, so he's been at Hogwarts three years and the headmaster and the staff never noticed or said anything about it? That means a cover up."

The fact that it was Harry Potter, son of the man and woman with supposedly the best student-teacher relationships—Lilly and McGonagall,  
and James and Dumbledore—*[*beggars belief*]*.* I don't know what that means.*

"I will be there in ten minutes," Rita said suddenly, vanishing.

Rebecca looked at her husband. "See," she said bitterly, "I told you"  
They sat down and just under ten minutes later, there was a knock at the door. Her husband got up to answer it.

He returned momentarily with Rita Skeeter. The two sisters eyed each other and Rebecca's husband wanting to break the ice, asked Rita if she wanted a coffee or a tea. It appeared neither heard him as they just stared at each other.

"Why did you feel the need to come here, Rita?" Rebecca's husband winced and from her tone, he knew he would be sleeping on the coach tonight.  
"Where is he?" Three simple words and he knew it would be more than one night.

"Piss off, sister."

Shit, the next month, at least, he thought. Why couldn't he keep his gob shut? He knew they hadn't gotten along ever since his squib wife found him in bed with her witch twin.

The fact his wife had perfect vision and Rita needed glasses and was marginally taller were the only physical differences between them. Now,  
his wife made herself look different every few days to make sure her sister never tried to impersonate her again; at the time, she had grabbed a golf club and put them both into hospital. He had to heal the muggle way, but even with potions and magical healing spells, Rita had been kept bedridden for three days.

Rita stared at her sister. She worked hard, but she knew she had no integrity; it rankled her that her twin sister was married, happy, and respected, but she knew she had crossed the line too many times. She sat down without being asked, looked her sister straight in the eye, and started to speak in a low, almost humble tone. "Do you remember when Dad was dying and he spoke to us his last words of wisdom?"

Her sister was reaching for a vase and she had no doubt it would soon meet her face. She held up her hand. "Please listen to me. Do you remember? He told us to follow our hearts and to be happy with who we were and what we had, not to become greedy or bitter.

"Then you met Alan and got married while I worked for a rag of a paper and was miserable, so I made others miserable. I started editing the truth. Then one day, I had a chance to sleep with Alan, and I took it."

Her sister held the vase in her hand unhappily; her husband had left the room at these words. No way was he going get involved in this; he had never even had a shandy since that night. Even though he had had a few drinks and in the back of his mind he had known it was Rita, not his wife, he had a fantasy of the two of them together. When it had happened, he and Rita had ended up in hospital with him homeless for five months till he managed to get her to take him back. It had taken eight years for them to talk to each other at the level they had before Rita had done that to them, and it was only in the last year that she had even spoken to Rita. No way was he going be within throwing distance of her.

Rita knew she was staring death in the face, but she had to say this;  
she knew her sister's temper was bad and even though she was a witch with a wand, her sister had a weapon to hand. If she made a move to her wand, it would in all probability be her last.

She lifted her hands up very slowly and put her palms out. Not to block an attack or anything, but to show her sister they were empty. "I came here because I heard Dad's voice, in a way. Follow your heart." The look in her sister's eyes still promised pain; she knew she should speed up and get to the point, but she also knew any of her words were pointless unless she explained it all. "Look, my heart says Potter's in trouble.  
Your red eyes and reaction to me mentioning Dumbledore show me you know something." She was about to lower her hands when she saw her sister's arms move back; she put her palms up again. "With no strings attached,  
no quills recording stuff or anything, please tell me: Does Potter need help?"

"Why would you care?" her sister asked. "You never care."

Though most people would react to that as though they had been slapped,  
or get angry, Rita did neither. "I don't care, but Daddy died because of Death Eaters. Potter killed He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named, and you are my sister." She looked down and went on in quiet voice. "You are my sister,  
and I forgot it once; never again. Please, a truce and a Witch's Oath from me." She looked up. "Please, help me become someone Daddy could be proud of."

"A Witch's Oath," her sister said. She stood up and Rita couldn't help but shrink into her chair. Her sister went over to a desk and opened it,  
the vase still in her hand. She took out a notebook and pen, went back to Rita, and started to write. She passed it over to her sister. "One funny move, one deviation, anything, and you won't be walking for a long time."

"I, Rita Alice Skeeter, swear by my magic and my life I shall never again betray my sister's trust and will never review anything she tells me without asking her first. So must it be," Rita read. There was a flash of light and then a small gong sounded; the magic had accepted her promise and would either make her a squib or kill her if she broke trust.

Her sister put down the vase and started to cry. Rita wanted to comfort her, but knew it might end badly, so she got up slowly and called Alan,  
never leaving the room. He came in and saw his wife, and a look of rage crossed his face. Rita passed him the notepad and he read it; looking back up at his wife, he went to put his arms around her. It took twenty minutes for her to stop crying, but when she looked up, she looked demonic; Rita swore to herself to never, ever make her sister that mad.

"Change forms."

Rita looked stunned. "I haven't any other."

"Your bug form!" her sister screamed. "Change now!"

Rita gulped and changed into her illegal animagus form. Her sister pointed to her own shoulder and Rita flew across to it and settled down.  
She looked at her husband and said in a normal tone, "Dinner's in the freezer. I will be back in awhile; get a bottle of wine in the refrigerator." Then she left. Alan sat down, frightened. This was bad.  
Very, very bad.

Rebecca got in the car and drove to where Harry was. She showed her pass at the door and went in; the staff nurse looked at her. "I can't sleep"  
she said. "I came to see him again, please." Rita had never heard her sister like this; how bad was it?

The nurse nodded. "Sometimes it helps to talk to them," she said. "I can't believe some people." She waved her through as she went through the door.

If Rita had hands and a voice box, she would have gasped and covered her mouth. There, his lightning bolt scar plain to see, was Harry Potter. He lay on a bed with all sorts of machines strapped to him. Her sister started to speak. "He is awake; he doesn't sleep unless he's doped up.  
He just keeps repeating the same words over and over again. He has a drip in his arm; he can't eat or drink. " She pulled back the covers.  
"This is after a month of treatment.

"He had a broken arm from years ago that had set badly, but we found no mention of it in any records. In fact, it seems he is in great health,  
as he has no medical history at all from when he was dropped at that place. The Dursley family doctor had never heard of Harry, nor had the local hospital."

Rita was stunned. The emasculated child in front of her was so small;  
his ribs showed and he was covered with scars. She would have guess he was eight or nine years old, even though she knew he was thirteen. Her sister lifted his hands up and showed them to her.

"See the fingertips? The calluses are not from piano or anything else you might expect. They are from were he constantly tried to get out of the two-by-four-by-three foot cupboard he was kept in till he went to Hogwarts."

Rita tried not to faint, but was having a troubled time of it. When she was told the galleon equivalent of what the Dursleys had been paid to take him in, and then how it had bought the house he lived in, Rita found out a bug could be sick. It didn't stop, though; her sister went on to tell about how Marge had her dog vaccinated after it bit Harry,  
and how he was fed through a cat flap if he was fed at all. Rita now knew the reason for the Oath; in her bug form, she had heard from Dumbledore's own mouth how he had left Harry there. She had only gone to Hogwarts to see what gossip there was and to check out some restricted books in the library.

Her sister took her off her shoulder and put her on the opposite side of the bed. "Change form when I give you the nod." Rita watched as her sister looked through the door, went out, and called for a drink. She came back in and nodded. Rita transformed and looked at Potter with her human eyes; if she had thought it was bad seeing him through bug eyes,  
now it was worse.

"I swear, when you get better, whoever was responsible will pay. You shall have a good home and love and I swear I will be with you." She didn't realise she had said it out load till she heard the gong again.

Her sister stared at her in shock. "You made a Witch's Oath."

Rita started, but her expression was firm. "I meant it. I didn't realise it was an Oath, but I meant it all the same." 


	3. Chapter 3

I do not own anthing you know from the canon, the rest is mine

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Chapter Three ----------------------

Alan was worried; they had been gone for nearly three hours, but even with bad traffic they should have been back an hour ago. He had never gone to see the boy, but what his wife had told him broke his heart.  
With Rita's interference, they hadn't had kids, and now might never have them.

Why was it taking so long?

At the hospital, Rita took one look at Potter—no, Harry, and cried. A voice said "bug" and on instinct she transformed. "Thanks, I don't think I should be in that form much longer." She held out a book. "I got this to read to him; I heard coma patients sometime say they heard a voice when they come out of it."

The duty nurse smiled. "Black Beauty, one of my favorites." She went over to the child and said in an almost-impossible to hear tone, "Come on, son, get well. The book's good, but you should see a real horse. It makes the book so much better." She turned away and put her hand on Rebecca's shoulder. "A good book shouldn't be rushed. Take your time. "

The social worker looked up at her. "If I have my way, he won't just look at a horse, he'll be riding one." The duty nurse was about to leave when she heard: "Thank you. Please let me know when he come around,  
won't you?" She knew it wasn't by rote but an automatic response to a need to know about the child.

"I will, Love, I will." She walked away.

Rebecca sat down and this time, she really did read from were she had left off. A bug crawled up onto Harry Potter's shoulder and started to rub its wings. Half an hour later, they left; twenty minutes after that,  
they returned to the house and went in. Rita transformed.

"Any change?" came Alan's voice from the kitchen.

"None. I read most of the book to him; I think I'll have to take him another one soon." Rita looked at her sister with a fire in her eyes.

"I don't want a truce." Her sister looked up fast. "I want my sister back." She got up and knelt in front of her. "I, the dumb one, humbly ask the wise, all-knowing sister one a simple question."

"What?" Alan looked confused.

"When we were kids and I found out I was a witch, we both read fables and all sorts. My sister liked the sphinx and other intelligent creatures and we used to call her the oracle, as she could help me and remember facts better than me."

A small smile played on Rita's mouth as her eyes suddenly focused onto what she had lost.

"How can I help?" Her sister got the glazed look she got often when given a hard problem to solve.

"You can't," Rita said. "Not till he awakens. But you can help me. Find all you can about his friends and that school; maybe then a plan will come to mind." She looked hard at her sister as Rebecca nodded.

"The oracle has spoken." She tapped Rita on the head.

As Rita stood, Alan's wife called to him: "Get dinner ready and the wine—I need it. And I think Rita does as well."

Alan looked stunned. "OK, who are you, and were is my wife? A minute ago you were ready kill her, and now you want to drink together? No way."

"Love, she gave a Witch's Oath. It means if she lies or does anything to hurt me, or you, she drops dead in best case, and in the worst, she dies a slow and very painful death. She also gave her oath to help Harry; she isn't trustworthy at all, but she can't break this oath, so why worry about it?"

Rita looked at her sister. "Can I call you Sissy again?"

"No, but I will let you call me Rebecca. It will take time before you get to even call me Becca, let alone Sissy."

Rita bowed her head. "OK, Rebecca. I shall earn it, even if it takes me the rest of my life."

Rebecca nodded. "I really could use that drink, Love," she called to her husband. Alan handed it to her and watched as his wife swallowed nearly the whole glass in one gulp. Rita took her glass and emptied it in one gulp as well; the two sisters looked at each other.

"Harry Potter shall be victorious over the world." Alan had a bemused expression on his face as they shared a true laugh. "Don't worry, Love"  
Rebecca said, "it's an old promise we made that if ever we found a prince worthy of us, we would help him all we could and live in castles with all sorts of magical animals, and help him rule the world."

"Hum, OK. Where do I fit into this, then?"

"Hum, stable hand, maybe?" she pondered. "Not sure yet, I'll work it out. I usually do"

"For some reason, that doesn't inspire confidence in me."

Rita got up. "I've got work to do; it's a shame, Alan and I need take a week or two off to care for you, isn't it, Rebecca?"

"No, see, it's comments like that that prove I've got the brains. We hate each other; why would you take a week off to help me?"

"Continue normal life and see me this weekend if nothing comes up before then. We need spy work, then we need him awake. They will suffer and we will rule the world."

Alan was now very worried. Rita left.

Each day, Rebecca went to see Harry and read him a bit of a book. Each weekend, her sister kept her informed of this and that going on in the wizarding world. Dumbledore wasn't happy Harry Potter had been missing for three months now, and on top of that, it had come to light that he wasn't supposed to go to the Dursleys under any circumstances. To make it worse, in the Potters' will, it was stated that Peter Pettigrew was the Secret Keeper and that if they were found dead, a bounty was to be placed on his head. In his rush to control Harry, Dumbledore never allowed the will to be properly read; it was easy with their old friends Sirius Black in jail and Remus Lupin a werewolf. It turned out Black was Harry's godfather but not his legal guardian; *[*it seemed his legal protector was the Tonks Andromeda and Ted Tonks lawyers at worse and also parents to an Auror.*] I have no idea what this sentence means.*

They had already found out Dumbledore had been dipping into Harry's trust fund to pay those bastards, the Dursleys, and now he had to pay every Knut back.

As Black had been cleared, he sued Dumbledore for failing to disclose vital evidence proving his innocence and the Ministry for keeping an innocent man imprisoned for over 50 million galleons. The fact that his and the Potters' votes had been illegally used meant Albus was lucky he was headmaster, but was no longer Head Mugwump; only his Order of Merlin kept him from jail.

Black had paid his fines and now he had to find Harry, as rumours in the Daily Profit said that maybe Dumbledore didn't want Potter found.

"Albus, would you care to give me an interview, please?" Bugger. Every time he went anywhere, Skeeter was there.

"I am off to see Minister Fudge. I am sorry, but this is important." Off he ran. Rita allowed herself a small smile; she was just about to walk off when something slapped her thigh. She twirled around, but no one was there; she looked down and found nothing.

Later that day, when she got home, she started to get undressed and saw a small handprint visible on her thigh. "What the hell?" She pulled her clothes back on and flooed her sister. Alan answered.

"Hi, Rita, Rebecca's at the hospital. What's up?" Rita thought about it,  
then decided her sister should be told immediately, so she told Alan what had happened and the hand print.

"OK, it seems unimportant, but Becky ought to be told. We will floo when you can come over."

Rita went to their house immediately. Some two hours later, she was telling her sister what had happened.

"Have you checked your pockets?" Rebecca asked. Rita had. "Was Dumbledore near you, or did he have his wand out?" Again a negative. "So it either a child with an invisibility cloak, someone really fast, or a prank."

"House elves are fast, and Harry was suppose to have a weird one; a free elf, if you can believe it. Now what was his name…."

"Dobby," Rebecca said. There was a loud crack and a house elf appeared in front of the startled group. There were socks on his ears, feet, and hands; warm, maybe, but all were different colours.

"You called Dobby."

Alan jumped back but Rebecca said, "Yes, Dobby. Why did you want to see us?"

The house elf started to move to a wall and head butt it. "Bad Dobby,  
bad Dobby. Dobby want help Harry Potter, Harry Potter is the greatest wizard ever."

"Yes, but why did you come to us, Dobby? And why did you slap Rita?"

"Dobby not slap Rita, he passed Rita a note, and Dobby knows the smell of Harry Potter. He knows when people have been near him. Dobby watched;  
he has seen the Skeeter woman and that she talks to Harry Potter. Dobby watched for long time and decided he wants to help."

They looked stunned. "What can you do to help Harry?" Rita asked.

Dobby sighed. "I don't know. Bonded house elves might help, but he wanted a friend, not a slave or a bonded elf." He broke down in tears.  
Rita Skeeter, liar, busybody, and general pain in butt did something that she would never quite understand. She knelt down and pulled the distraught house elf toward herself.

"Shush, it's OK, it's OK. It will get better. Shush there, stop crying"  
She didn't know it, but seeing Harry and this elf had snapped something in her brain; all of a sudden, her maternal instincts had kicked in a major way. Her sister looked at her with a small smile on her face, but when Rita turned to her, she nearly stepped back. This wasn't the pain-in-arse Rita or the hard bitch reporter Rita; this was a mother dragon protecting its nest.

"We'll cure him, we'll train him, we'll protect him," Rita said. "He is mine. No more pain, no more suffering. Even if we have to take over the world and have everything crushed under our feet. Harry Potter will live and he will have a life, a family, and happiness. So mote it be!" A blinding flash, and all realised she had taken another Witch's Oath, but more than that. Rebecca realised she had done it with no wand in her hand and the shear power of it had left dots and flashes in her eyes.

"What just happened? Did you make another Oath, Rita?" One look at Rita's shocked face showed she hadn't, or at least hadn't intended to.

"What, what happened?" The small house elf looked stunned.

"I don't know, I don't know."

A small, squeaky voice piped up. "I bounded, I bounded!" Tears ran down Dobby's face. "I bounded, I am not free elf."

A look of horror crossed Rita's face. "Please say you didn't bond to me or any of us here. Please."

The elf cocked his head to one side, then the other. "Missy, I don't know what or who I bounded to. This doesn't feel right."

Alan decided to say something. "Dobby, when did you meet Harry?"

Dobby went on to tell them all about the diary and the Chamber of Secrets. At the mention of a Basilisk, Rita and her sister went white;  
after they showed Alan a description of a Basilisk in a book, he went white as well.

"How big was it?"

Dobby explained that it could stretch from the wall to the far end of the back garden and was as wide as sofa across its head. If he hadn't been sitting down, Alan would have fallen down. "90 to 100 feet long and nine feet across its head," Dobby said.

Rita looked up. "How old was it, Dobby? I never heard of one that big."

Dobby made a humming noise before he answered. "Well, Salazar Slytherin put it in there, so as old as the school, plus however old it was when Salazar put it in there."

"In the book of things you never want to meet," Rita said, "the top ones are He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named, a nundu ,a Basilisk, a Dementor, and a dragon guarding its young."

"Well, nundu and dragon and Dementors are left, then the boy has the set," Alan joked.

"No sir, he faced Dementors," Dobby said. They all turned to him.

"Oh yes," Rita said, "when on Hogwarts Express, they were looking for Sirius Black."

Dobby looked worried. "Dobby, when else did he see them?" asked Rebecca.

"Well, he saw two on the train, as Missy said. He saw four at his Quidditch game. Plus when he discovered Sirius Black was innocent and Peter Pettigrew was alive, he fought 150 with his Patronus." It was to much for Rita; her eyes rolled up and she passed out.

Alan looked at his wife and asked what happened. "Rita's seen one Dementor when she went to try get interview with Black," Rebecca explained. "She's had nightmares about it for years."

Alan looked at the book again. Dementors cannot be killed, he read as Rita started to come back around. They drain all happiness and emotion from a victim; no wizard has ever faced more than four at one time and lived. No one can overcome the total feeling of despair created when they flock together. Evan in Azkaban, no more than ten Dementors are kept in the place at once.

Dobby started to rock himself, tears spilling from his eyes. "Dobby is worried. Only nundu and dragon are left, will they come now?"

Rita shushed him and held him gently in her arms. "No. With He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named dead and—" She stopped. "Dobby, what do you mean, he fought the Basilisk and the evil man?"

"He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named was in chamber when they fought," Dobby said.  
Rita shot up, nearly dislodging Dobby.

"He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named is back? He's supposed to be dead."

"No, Missy, in Harry Potter's first year he fought He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named. The evil man had one of his Death Eaters,  
Professor Quirrell, absorb him, and they drank unicorn blood so they both lived. Harry Potter killed Quirrell and shoved the evil man's soul out of him, then in his second year the evil man drained Ginny Weasley of her magic and soul and while Harry Potter fought the Basilisk, he got a body back again, but Harry Potter with Gryffindor's sword killed the Basilisk and the evil man and saved Ginny Weasley."

The word "stunned" did not fit Rita's reaction. If He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named was back and around, Dumbledore had kept it quiet; that meant no defense had been launched against him. Rebecca got up and went out the front door. Fifteen minutes later, she came back.  
Her husband and sister hadn't moved. She went into the kitchen and came back with three glasses and poured three very large brandies. They all drank at once; she refilled the glasses and they downed them again.

"No fucking wonder the poor kid's gone nuts," Alan said. "This is the top magical school in England and one of the best in world we talking about, isn't it?" He looked at his wife. "Honey, if we have magical kids, no fucking way are they going to Hogwarts."

She only nodded her head. Dobby looked up. "I got to go, I'm being called."

Albus wasn't happy. All his plans and esteem had gone down the drain and only one person was to blame: Harry bloody Potter. All he had do was stay at Privet Drive, come to school, and do as he was told. No, he had to disappear, clear his godfather's name, cost him Albus position as High Mugwump and have the teaching staff turn away from him. When Harry had gone missing and after a huge search, the staff had found the Dursleys; after a quick Legilimency reading, they found out the Dursleys had been treating Harry very badly.

That was bad. But it was Nymphadora Tonks who had found it out; she had also found out that Sirius was innocent, and on top of that, she had uncovered Dumbledore's work. She had convinced Sirius to come in and go straight to Amelia Bones where, under Veratiserum, he swore he not killed Peter Pettigrew and that he wasn't the Potters' Secret Keeper.  
The simple questions "If everyone knew I was the Secret Keeper, then what the point in me being a Secret Keeper? And who said I was a Secret Keeper in the first place?" seemed to smash into Amelia and Tonks with astonishing force. They knew a set up when they saw one.

A quick trip to the Prophet and then Gringotts, and the Blacks—Narcissa and Bellatrix—were disinherited, and Andromeda was brought back into the family. When the Aurors went over the Potters' accounts and saw how much the Dursleys were paid to look after Harry, and then how much Dumbledore had removed, a cover-up wasn't all they smelled.

This was when it went really bad. The Potters' will showed that Dumbledore had no rights to Harry. The passage that read "Peter Pettigrew is our Secret Keeper and if you are reading this then he a traitor" was even worse. The fact Dumbledore had skipped the will reading, and the goblin in charge had allowed it, cost that goblin his life and half of his holdings. Gringotts managers did not look kindly on this sort of behaviour, and it was only some old laws that stopped them chopping Dumbledore's head off and sticking it in the front door.  
Another old law stopped his Order of Merlin, First Class being stripped from him. Rita bloody Skeeter was a constant pain in his side. The school governors were after him being sacked, and if they found out anymore of his secrets, he would be in Azkaban.

Dumbledore wasn't delusional, but he had a blind spot to his own faults.  
His plan was simple: find Harry, regain control of him, get himself made Harry's guardian, and after Harry killed Riddle, then let the lad have a nice life. Now as more time passed, it was looking like Harry and Riddle would kill each other after Potter made him the main beneficiary.

A pop sounded and the bloody annoying house elf stood there. "Has Headmaster found Harry Potter?" Dobby asked.

Dumbledore shook his head. "I am so sorry, but we looked at all his relatives and friends and we have searched high and low. I was hoping you might have some news."

Dobby could barely contain himself. Family? The great Dumbledore had called them bastards! Harry Potter's family? What a wanker.

"Dobby will tell you as soon as he has something he thinks you should know. Any small thing that might help. Can Dobby carry on looking?" By this time, he was bouncing on his toes as if he was a small child wanting the toilet. The headmaster waved him off.

It was then that a strange Harry Potter-type coincidence happened. Dobby popped, but didn't leave the room; he hid in it. He wanted to know what the wanker was up to.

"Dumbledore, I told you to keep a tight reign on that child, not to strangle him." If Dobby could have gone white, he would have.

"Why did you set him against Riddle so soon? He had no training, and—"

" I know," spoke up Dumbledore, "but the prophecy states—"

"We told you to tell him of the prophecy," a new voice cut in. "Have you?"

A "No" from Dumbledore was all it took. Dobby left, and this time he made no noise. Most would be surprised, but elves had decided not to let wizards know how they went from place to place and as wizards made a noise when they Apparated, so did elves. As wizards didn't know silent Apparition, the elves decided not to tell them. He went to the oldest house elf in Hogwarts. He knelt before him.

"What do you want?" came the caustic tone. No house elf liked Dobby, as he was free.

"Sir, you are bonded to the school, not to a person within it. I wish to speak and the headmaster must not know of it."

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Thanks to beta Lanie McCoy 


	4. Chapter 4

I do not own anthing you know from the canon, the rest is mine ---------------------------------------------

Chapter Four -----------------------------------------------------

Rita, Rebecca, and Alan were still chatting some 40 minutes later when Dobby reappeared. "Ask Dumbledore of the prophesy next time you see him,  
Miss Skeeter."

Rita sat upright. Tomorrow she would go to the Hall of Records to see what was listed in the restricted Prophesy section. Dobby turned to Rebecca and quietly said, "He will get better, but we need to find a place to put him that no one can find. We need you and your husband to look after him."

"How would our family country house be?" Rebecca asked. Dobby shook his head. "What about that secret chamber in Hogwarts that you mentioned"  
Again he shook his head.

Alan looked up and, in his typically irreverent fashion, said, "Shame Atlantis don't exist. We could send him there." Dobby's head shot up and he started to nod and dance. "I was joking," Alan said. "Really,  
Atlantis is real."

But Dobby was laughing and jumping up and down. "Harry Potter, sir, be safe there. First we heal him, then move him and you." Dobby sat down and his smile grew bigger.

"Dobby, who are you bonded to?" Rita asked quietly.

"Dobby is not bonded to anyone, he is a free elf."

"You said you were bonded and now you say you're not. I'm confused; none of us gave you clothes, and Harry isn't here, so who?"

Dobby's grin became almost feral. "Dobby is bonded to the idea of making Harry Potter have a good, long, happy, free life. Dobby is not bonded to a person, he bonded to an idea."

"I did not know that was possible, I've never heard of such a thing"  
Rita exclaimed.

"It shouldn't be," Dobby said quietly. "It isn't, but it has happened. A Basilisk that a 15-wizard squad should have killed was beaten by a 12-year old. An evil wizard who is only scared of Dumbledore has been beaten three times by the same child. Harry Potter and the word 'impossible' are often used in the same sentence."

It was decided that a plan was needed, and a list was made of items that would be needed to accomplish it. Dobby said he would get some Polyjuice Potion and that would help.

A week later, all was in place. The three humans had no idea how to travel around to complete the plan, but they trusted Dobby. Rita had a big grin on her face and her sister wanted to know why.

"I caught up with Dumbledore yesterday."

Rebecca got a grin. "And?"

"Well," said Rita, "it seems the words 'Harry Potter' and 'prophecy' can nearly kill an old man; it looked like he had a stroke." She smiled as she remembered his face changing colour, his change of direction, and his almost athletic turn of speed at her words. "I went bug and hitched a ride. I had tried everything to get into that room of his, but nothing; this was my last hope."

Rita recalled how she had come to hear about the prophecy. As Dumbledore had been the one to hear it, he had access to the record, and he wanted to make sure it was still there. With a minimum of fuss, he got into the hall of prophesy. It was still there, listed by number, he who had heard it, and she who had said it. If Rita's bug eyes could have, they would have bugged out at the date and the listener. She had memorised all the details and as soon as she could, she had written them down.

By the time the next full moon was about, Rita, Rebecca, Alan, and Harry were gone; if they hadn't been, Rita might have covered the story about Severus Snape vanishing.

The owl wasn't one known to the Blacks; it had come through the window and landed in front of Sirius. After a quick check to make sure it wasn't cursed, the gaunt man removed the letter from the owl's leg.  
Remus and Tonks came in to the kitchen.

"Wotcher, who's the newest fan woman, then?" Tonks laughed.

"No idea," Sirius replied, grinning. "Seems that since I'm not a murder anymore but a rich bachelor, I've become very desirable." Tonks picked up two drinks and passed one to Remus, sitting down. Remus waited till she had a mouth full of drink before he spoke:

"As long as this one likes doggy style, he be OK."

The drink exploded from Tonks' nose. She turned to the laughing man and hit him hard in the stomach.

"Those fucking bastards!" Sirius exploded. "I'll kill them all!" He stood jerkily, about to rush off.

"Is it Harry?" Remus asked, sobering immediately. "Has someone sent a ransom?" His time in Azkaban and the fact Remus was a strong werewolf made it easy for him to quickly push Sirius back down. Sirius took a deep breath and passed the letter over.

"A women around a lot of ink and hospitals," Remus said. Tonks hit him.

"Read the bloody letter already, I've gotta go to work soon."

"OK, Love," Remus said, fussing her hair. They had gotten together shortly after Sirius's release from prison; they had needed help to trace Harry and Tonks had been more than happy to help. Remus picked the letter up again. "Please do not bin this letter!"

Tonks jumped. "Git."

"No, it's in capitals so it must be shouted."

"Read the fucking letter so we can kill the bastard!" snapped a very pissed-off Sirius.

"I know you must have a lot of fan mail and such." Tonks sniggered, but a glare from Sirius made Remus continue. "But this isn't about you.  
Well, it is, in a way. Were you aware that three weeks before Lilly and James Potter were killed, a prophecy was made?" Remus jerked back in his chair as all playfulness fell from Tonks. "The prophecy was given by one Sybil Trelawney, but that isn't important. It was given to one Albus Dumbledore and one Severus Snape."

Remus's hands were shaking. "As you know, Severus always gave Harry a hard time at school, but in case you didn't know, he was a Death Eater at the time he heard the prophecy. You can check that fact out in the court records taken some time after the Potter tragedy. He gave up several Death Eaters and one Albus Dumbledore spoke up for him, saying that Severus was a spy for him. But he refused to say when he was a spy?" Tonks went to the cupboard, pulled out a bottle of Ogden's Fire Whiskey, and drank straight from the bottle. She passed it to her cousin, who gulped it down like water and passed it to Remus.

All three had an unholy fire in their eyes; none of them liked Severus and none was big in the Dumbledore fan club. Two, however, were big fans of the Potters, and the reason that a certain Albus Dumbledore had told the Potters with certainty that Voldemort was after them, and that they needed hide under the Fidelius Charm, seem to click in their heads.

A quick floo to Amelia Bones and Sirius, Tonks, Remus were in her office. After she read the note, she called into a dark mirror and asked for conformation. A few minutes later, a disembodied voice confirmed such a prophecy, but couldn't say as to its contents. With all they had uncovered before the loss of the Aurors, the news about Harry had hit Amelia hard. "You weren't here; I never saw you today."

With that they left.

The night of the full moon, Severus was out looking for a rare herb. He had a lot on his mind. He had done as the headmaster had said and believed him; after Potter had, gone he had found the Dursleys and,  
after reading their minds, had wanted to kill them, but the self loathing he felt for what he had added to Potter's torment was even worse. He had treated him like another James and then found out it was all lies. He had sworn to himself that he would get down on bended knee and apologise to Potter and tell him the whole story as soon as he was well.

He never saw the Grim-like form behind him or for it to change into Black; he never saw Black pull his wand. He did, however, hear the stunner coming, but not in time. A pounding headache and slowly it all came into view: he was trapped, naked. A man sat opposite him.

"You hated James, me, and Remus, but Lilly, I thought you cared for her." Snape tried to speak, but was cut off. "With you, Albus, and Peter, they never stood a chance. Well, I am going to give you the same chance. After I unbind you, I'm going for a run; I hear there's a werewolf in the Forbidden Forest. Oh well." With that, he shimmered and became a Grim-like beast again and ran off.

From somewhere behind him, a spell hit Severus; he tried to shout, but no sound come out. He needed Black to know the truth. A long howl sounded from far away, but how far? Severus got up as the binding was released and started to run. His legs were wobbly, but he had to survive. He had to tell Black everything. Or Potter. Yes, he had made mistakes, but he had not told the Dark Lord the prophecy; he had even tried to warn Lilly.

Another howl. It was closer now; his only though was "Shit, how fast can a werewolf run?" As he ran, he stumbled on the idea to climb a tree. It never entered his head that a werewolf could jump and nearly climb a tree of the sizes around here; if he got to larger trees he might be able to hide. The next howl told him that he wouldn't; in fact, three minutes later, his throat was ripped out, his arms and legs nearly severed. The ghost left the body of Severus Snape. As it formed, it almost clinically looked at it the remains of its former body being eaten.

"Well, guess I'm not going be turned into a werewolf, then." When the werewolf had finished, a Grim came over, cocked its leg, and pissed on the remains. After they were gone, the other meat-eating denizens of the forest came forward. By morning, nothing remained; even the bones were gone. The only thing left was the shade of Severus, doomed to remain here until he could tell his story to Potter. He knew it was going to be a long time.

None of this was known to Rita, Rebecca, or Alan; not even to Harry or Dobby. It was doubtful that they would have cared, anyway. The first part of their plan went off without a hitch: Rita, in her bug form, went into Harry's room. Alan and Rebecca went in after, and Harry was given a Polyjuice Potion with a hair from another patient. Alan wheeled the transformed Harry out wearing a hospital porter's garb.

Once they had gone, Rita, transformed back into a human, took another Polyjuice Potion with Harry's hair in it. Rebecca ran out and called the duty nurse to say Harry was moving. The duty nurse ran down to check on her patient and Rebecca said she would wait outside while the nurses did their thing. The nurse was grateful, as she didn't want to have to send her out, but as soon as Rebecca had offered, the nurse knew that she knew she would be in the way. The doctors rushed in after the nurse and soon, all sorts of test were done. Half an hour later, the doctors came out of Harry's room and a few minutes later, so did the nurse. She smiled.

"He isn't awake, but he isn't moaning anymore, and he seems to be in a normal sleep. His heart rate, blood pleasure, and other vitals are all normal. Go on, love, go see him." Rebecca smiled in response and went in after, nodding her thanks. As Rita returned to normal, she woke.

"That wasn't pleasant; I took the potion and zonked out. It was like I was nowhere; I think it's only because I had my mind and not his that I didn't go into a coma. Next time I think I'll use a charm to change my looks. Damn, this bed is uncomfortable."

A small Obliviate charm every time someone came in convinced them that the child was sleeping and Rebecca was reading to him. At his home, Alan took Harry through the back door from the garage and into kitchen via a door Rita had placed there magically to make their lives easier.

For the first time, Alan got to see Harry Potter. He was skinny and small for his age, a vivid lightning bolt stood out on his forehead, but other than that, nothing seem special about him. Certainty nothing to show his hardships. He took him upstairs and laid him on a bed. He wanted to undo the child's pajama top and give him a quick wash, like his wife had said, but as soon as he saw the emaciated and scarred body,  
he felt ill. Now, he knew this child had a hard life; the skinniness could be attributed to a lack of solid food, but the sheer amount of scars and abrasions couldn't. Harry Potter, even though lost in his own mind, had gained another supporter.

Dobby popped in and burst into tears. "Dobby will take care of the great Harry Potter, sir." And the elf seem to vanish in a blur. An array of potions appeared and the phone rang; Alan got up and went to answer it.

"Hi, this is Alan."

"Honey, it's great news: Harry's not awake, he's still fast asleep, but it's not a coma—it's reading as a true sleep."

Alan was puzzled. Rita was supposed to waken, not remain asleep; what the hell had gone wrong?

"I told the nurse you went home with all the fuss here. Can you pick me up in maybe two hours, please, Love?"

"Yes, no problem, Honey. See you then." And Alan put the phone down.  
Dobby appeared next to him and made him jump.

"Harry Potter sir is very ill. Dobby thinks Harry Potter needs his head examined." Alan was about to laugh at a conceived joke, but stopped himself.

"How would you go about examining his head?"

Dobby started to pace back and forth. "Dobby can't, but an empath could.  
So could a Legilimens, but both would tell someone else, or leave a report. Hum, this hard." A smile suddenly appeared on his face. "I think the headmaster can help us." As he explained his plan, Alan smiled.

"OK, give it a go."

Dobby popped off and into the headmasters room. Albus jumped when that bloody Dobby appeared before him, wringing his hands and looking miserable. Ha, as if a bloody pet could be miserable.

He never noticed Fawkes give him a strange look. A look Fawkes had been giving him for some time. He didn't know the Imperious Curse on Fawkes was slipping; soon, the phoenix would leave him with all the problems because of that bloody Potter kid. He hadn't been paying a lot of attention. Fawkes had been his familiar since he was young, but ever since he betrayed the Potters and the Longbottoms for the greater good,  
Fawkes had gone hard towards him. It was only a hasty Imperious that stopped him losing the bird and some of his glory. Plus, only a dark wizard couldn't have a phoenix as a familiar. It had disturb him at the time, but he wrote it off as the bird's small brain being unable to comprehend the big picture. Why, yes, it cost the Longbottoms their sanity and the Potters their lives, but they had nearly ten years without Riddle and very few Death Eater attacks, so the amount saved outweighed the four lives—well, five if you included Harry, or six if you included Sirius, but it was still a small price.

What Dumbledore didn't know was that not only was Fawkes breaking free,  
he had chosen his new friend: a certain Harry Potter. A certain Harry Potter who he could smell on the elf in front of him, a certain Harry Potter who the elf was worried about and lying about.

"Yes, Dobby, what is it? Have you any news?"

The look on Dobby's face said it all. "No, sir, but sir, Headmaster sir…." Geez he hated acting like an idiot in front of this windbag. "I has an idea. What about Hedwig, his owl?"

Dumbledore broke in, "I gave Hedwig to Ron Weasley, as I thought he might be able to get her to find Harry."

Now Dobby was confused. He was Harry Potters sir's friend, not Weasley's friend; why had he given Hedwig to Ron and not Sirius Black, who was the boy's guardian? "Headmaster sir, you got me wrong. I know a great man like you thinks of that, but that is not my whole idea."

Dumbledore looked at the elf. "What is the rest of your idea?"

"Well, Headmaster sir, I was popping around, looking for the great wizard Harry Potter," he said, trying to annoy Dumbledore, "and I thought if I had Hedwig with me, she is bonded to Harry Potter sir, and if I get her close enough, she might find him. It might take me two or three weeks to pop all over Great Britain, but I should be able to pop and stay in one place with Hedwig. Then with luck, even if an evil wizard has him in a Fidelius-charmed house, Hedwig might be able to sense him but not find him. Then I could come get you and you could use your great powers to beat up evil people and get the great Harry Potter back!"

Dumbledore nearly fell out of his seat. He knew a bound animal would be unable to get into a protected place, but would be able to narrow down the search area. A genuine smile lit his face and his eyes sparkled. It was a damn shame he couldn't read a house elf's mind—the sparkle looked good, but any ideas he could steal were better. "OK Dobby, great idea! I will get her and then you can start."

A floo call to Ron didn't go well, and when he finally got Hedwig, she was in a bad way. It seemed Ron only wanted her to torment her, as the Weasleys weren't getting to look after Harry over holidays. They had lost a third of their income besides; Ginny was pissed off that Harry might have another women and get married before she could get her hands on him and his cash. And Ron was annoyed that he had lost money,  
thinking Harry had it all.

The whole bloody family was thick, as far as Albus was concerned. If Harry turned up and wanted Hedwig back, then a half-dead bird his supposed friend was supposed to be looking after wasn't the best way to stay in his good graces. The only saving grace was that the bloody elf had buggered off to sort out treats and something.

Or so he thought; Dobby had actually gone and silent popped himself and the oldest house elf back into the headmaster's office. They stood and listened to Ron argue that it was his bloody bird and he wasn't giving it back, Ginny screaming about how it was her man and no whore better get him so hand over the bird. Molly was screaming to hand over the bird so she could look after the little wanker and get her cash back.

When Dumbledore finally got the sodding bird back, a couple of healing charms and some water made her looked like she been in a mild war. He decided to blame a prank of the twins' gone wrong and, as the elves were so stupid they would never know. Well, normally they wouldn't, but the oldest elf was four feet away and, as he was bonded to the school, he could see for the first time in a long time all Dumbledore's thoughts.  
He was no longer happy; he made the elf sign "See me before you go" and vanished so Dobby could pop in.

Pop! Albus jumped and Dobby immediately screamed, "Great wizard Harry Potter's Hedwig! What happened to her? He will be so mad and so sad."

"Calm down, it's not as bad as it looks. The Weasley twins played a prank, and sadly it hit Hedwig and not Ron." He sniggered. "Well, not that I wish Ron any harm, but it would have been easier to fix him, and faster. Please take care of her and start searching as soon as you can."

Pop! Dobby and Hedwig were gone. None of them had noticed that Fawkes was gone as well.

Dobby appeared before the elf court and jumped. He had expected to appear just before the oldest elf here.

"Creature known as Dobby, you are here to answer some questions."

A proud Dobby stood straight. "Well, you can bloody well wait till Harry Potter's owl is cared for," he said indignantly. "Them fucking Weasleys have hurt her bad; she is not a Weasley friend, she is a Potter friend"  
With that, he called for potions and an animal caregiver from amongst those watching. After he was sure Hedwig was being seen to, he turned to face the court. "So what do you old windbags want now? More of 'Dobby should do this,' 'Dobby shouldn't be free.' Well Dobby is bonded, happy?"

The court looked on, stunned, and one member of the court knelt before Dobby. "Dobby, we have been wrong. It was seen inside the Headmaster's head, a true prophecy, as you said. It was also shown that the things Harry Potter—" A murmur went through the hall, "All praise Harry Potter," and a small "Ahem, quiet" went through after, "suffered through were known about or set up by the Headmaster, and he would have him facing dragons and such next. He was setting up a Tri-Wizard Tournament and working out how to get the Chosen One's name into the Goblet of Fire. We can no longer deny it: Harry Potter is the greatest wizard ever. As such, as you are his friend, you are the greatest house elf ever."

A gasp ran through the hall. "How can we help you and Harry Potter? No elf shall betray him; the time of prophecy may well be upon us."

Dobby stooped his shoulders and called for Hedwig. She was given to him.  
"I will try to save Harry Potter, but he is lost in his own head. I can't think of anyone who would help him and not run to Black, the Evil One, Dumbledore, or some other who will stop my bond from working properly."

The old elf stood up and stared at Dobby, noticing the strange colour of his bond. "Who, or what, are you bonded to?"

"I am bonded to the idea of Harry Potter having a happy life, free of machinations and evil."

A gasp ran through the place as this sunk in; even the old elf shook his head as his eyes widened in wonder. "The time of prophecy could truly be before us," he said. It was here that poor Dobby got the wrong end of the stick again. Dumbledore had been speaking of the Potter-Riddle fight prophecy; so had Rita, when she confirmed it; so had the old elf when he had admitted knowing about it to the court. Dobby, on the other hand,  
had been thinking of the house elf prophecy that the old elf had referred to after the last revelation about who Dobby was bonded to.

Another Harry Potter thing, all things coming to help him—just not from who or where he expected. If anyone had worked it out or known, they would have guessed that one person was trying to fulfill two prophecies and not get in Harry's way. As no one did, it was another strange coincidence, or so some would think. Others would think Harry Potter had the worst luck in the world. If they knew the two prophecies had at that moment decided to join forces, working together, most people would fill their underpants and look up how to Apparate to another planet before standing between Harry Potter and his no concrete destiny. That is,  
unless they knew of Dobby's bonding and how the elves had sided with Harry; then they would probably look into long-range Apparition into another galaxy.

Our reluctant hero was, at the time, wandering in his own thoughts. Dead people blamed him for their deaths, and each one locked him in the cupboard; his friends blamed him for their misfortunes and they locked him in the cupboard; his godfather and Remus blamed him for everything and they locked him in the cupboard; the Dursleys blamed him for locking them up and locked him in the cupboard. Each time he was locked in, he reverted to his smallest, most scared self, crying, screaming, hitting,  
and kicking the door, all to no avail. Then the whole process started again. It was an above-average vicious circle, but now the two prophecies were working together; the ancient elf prophecy had some ideas and with its age had come its cunning. All would have been well if Dumbledore hadn't interfered, the second prophecy agreed.

"The hat, the hat, it could help, it helped before!" shouted a squeaky voice. The two prophecies smiled. Dobby looked up.

"What hat?"

An old elf stood up. "The Sorting Hat carried Godric Gryffindor's sword to Harry Potter. The Headmaster thinks it was a replica, but it was, in fact, the original. The blade the Headmaster was going to send would have indeed killed the creature, and maybe faster, but the original called to me and so did the hat. They said they were to be given to Harry Potter."

"Given to him?" squeaked several elves.

The old elf looked around. "It seems as we have been lax and done more for what the teachers want than what the students need, or the school wants. If the hat and sword spoke to you and told you to give them to Harry Potter, why are they still in the Headmaster's study? You are the keeper of artifacts, not him." The old elf sat down. "So much lost, so much out of our control."

The keeper replied, "He took them from Harry Potter. Said he had loaned them to him."

A fire lit in a lot of elves' eyes. No one went against the school or the founders with impunity.

"Give Dobby the hat and the sword," the keeper said. He looked at Dobby.  
Dobby put the hat on his head and the sword in his hand. "Maybe it will awaken him."

If any elf could have heard the pitch of a phoenix's words, they would have heard Fawkes' invisible form say: "And if they can't, I will."

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Thanks to beta Lanie McCoy 


	5. Chapter 5

Chapter Five

The keeper of antiquities vanished; ten minutes later, he appeared with the hat and sword. "I left the fake sword and an old-looking hat in their place; I bet he doesn't notice till Sorting time." He walked over to Dobby and handed them to him. "The time of prophecies is near. All shall be revealed; I have warned and I have begged. The four houses are still separate; if Hogwarts is to survive, then it all rests in the hands of Harry Potter." Now every eye in the hall glowed as yet another Harry Potter thing happened.

"Dobby, how did you bond to Harry Potter?" Dobby's big eyes looked up and he told them, word for word, what he had said. Twenty minutes later,  
the house elves were still trying to see right; even Fawkes had been nearly blinded, and the two prophecies would have blinked if they had eyes.

"All Hogwarts elves will help you and Harry Potter in this," said the oldest elf. "I know from what you have told me that Harry Potter is concerned more about his friends than himself. We are his friends; the school itself is his friend. The relics of the founders are his friends.  
I know in his heart the things that would make him happy are a good school and his school friends being happy. Go, Dobby, cure him; let him train, then all shall be as it should."

Dobby vanished and it really was a shame, because the old elf just remembered he hadn't corrected Dobby about what prophecy Dumbledore had heard. Oh well, one prophecy or the other, did it really matter? Now they were all for him. Actually it did, but he didn't need to know that yet; the prophecies smirked (to the extent that they could).

"I wonder where he'll take him so bad people and things can't get him"  
muttered the old elf.

By the time Dobby got back, Alan, Rebecca, and Rita were sitting in the front room; a sob from one or the other made the elf feel bad. When they saw Hedwig, they gasped.

"Did elf travel do that to her?" Rebecca asked.

"No, the bloody Weasleys done it to her. Harry Potter's supposed best mate, who just happens to work for Dumbledore, did it to her. Ron bloody I-want-everything-given-to-me Weasley. He did it to her," snapped a very irritated Dobby. Then a smile formed on his lips. "It seems now that they're not looking after Harry, and Black has control of the money, the Weasleys are poor again as they're not getting Harry Potter's money.  
Ginny and Ron and Molly are only bothered about the money; I didn't see any other Weasley."

"Hum…." Rita opened and shut her mouth before speaking. "Why did they have Hedwig?"

Dobby went on to explain about the Headmaster and his plans.

"So did you trick him, then, Mate?" called Alan. A feral grin broke out on Dobby's face.

"No, but it seems I didn't need to." He pulled the hat and the sword out of the air. The hat's mouth opened.

"Who are you, and where is Harry Potter?" Then he saw Rita. "So, Miss Skeeter, you are involved in this? Tell me all."

After the whole explanation, Fawkes, who was still invisible, and the hat were stunned, but for different reasons.

"How did you leave if—?"

The hat smiled. "You waited till Rebecca was gone, then when all could see you still in room, you changed and went out the window. As it was several stories up, no one would think that was how the child got out."

The adults laughed. "Bugger, wish we had thought of that," or words to that effect came from all three.

"No," said a smiling Alan, "we used Polyjuice, then a glamour. Then when 'he' woke up after some tests, he was taken out side by an orderly for fresh air. Our perfect plan, and such a simple one was in front of us"  
He ruefully shook his head. "We waited till the police were there, then stunned the orderly and drove off after grabbing Harry."

"We hope the police put two and two together and come up with someone from this unknown school of St Brutus or a Dursley friend," Rita said.  
"Either way, the police are now searching for Harry Dursley."

The hat looked confused. "Harry Dursley? " Here came another Harry moment and this was, for once, sheer bloody luck.

"Yes," Alan said, "the officer who took statements got interrupted by Marge Dursley and was so angry that he never noticed he had written Harry Dursley instead of Harry Potter. Then, when they admitted him, a glance at the notes showed the police had been at the Dursleys'  
residence and that his name was Harry Dursley."

His wife piped up, "And we never corrected them; it seemed safer."

The hat smiled. "So what's the plan? And how can I make it better?"

If a hat could faint, it would have when they said they were going to Atlantis. As it was, Fawkes flickered and anyone watching would have seen a startled phoenix. "How it was lost long before Hogwarts was founded? It was legend even back then!"

Dobby smiled. "As you said, all will be revealed."

Fawkes was old, very old, but as a chick on his birth, he had been given some memories by his parents that they had received from theirs. He knew Atlantis had existed, but no phoenix in three generations had been to it or even knew where it was. Or so he thought. After the plan was explained and the hat made a few alterations to it, the hat, Dobby, the sword, and the invisible phoenix went upstairs with a small pop. The humans followed and were halfway up when a knock came to the door.

"I'll go up and cast a spell over us," Rita said as Rebecca went to the front door.

Outside were two police officers. Rebecca got a big smile on her face.  
"Is Harry fully awake? He was stirring a bit when I left. Have anymore—"

One officer held up his hand and she stopped. "I am sorry to tell you this, but—" That was as far as he got as the women in front of him burst into tears.

"B-but he was getting better, he was! That's why I left, how—why—when—"

"We don't know he's dead; he's been kidnapped."

Rebecca's head shot up. "Come in, please, tell me how I can help." The two officers came in and Rebecca called her husband down. He sat on the sofa next to his distraught wife.

"What is it, Honey?"

A sob and then: "Harry's been kidnapped!" Alan was crap at acting, but the thought that the cops suspected them made his face go white. His wife saw an opportunity. "They have not found a body and they're hoping he's not de-dead," she sobbed.

Alan took a deep breath and held onto her. "How can we help you?"

The older cop looked at them and shook his head. "We don't know you can.  
We're hoping that you might have seen a red van nearby, or even better,  
people near a red van. If not, if you saw anyone you didn't recognise near the hospital doors…." He shook his head "It's a hospital, so you wouldn't know many, but we were hoping you might have seen someone different, as you visit Harry regularly, Mrs Davis."

Yes, you guessed it: Another Harry Potter thing had happened. Alan Davis was the cousin of Tracy Davis, a girl known as the Slytherin Ice Queen.  
The reason she spoke to no one and was known as the Ice Queen was simple: She didn't want anyone to know she had two muggles in the family. If she started to chat, she might let it slip, and that wouldn't be good in Slytherin.

"A red van was parked out near the hospital's rear entrance, straight up and then a left towards the Chinese takeaway. At the crossing on the left, there was a van there. I saw it when I went to get a new menu from the restaurant."

The two officer wrote this down. "What sort of van was it?"

"Well, I didn't see it well, but I would say a Volkswagen. I'm sorry,  
but I was looking more at the posh jag next to it and thinking an old van like that next to a posh jag was bit out of character."

"Why would you think of it as out of character?" snapped the young officer. He blushed as he realised he had spoke out of turn.

"Well, they seemed to know each other. When I looked in rear view mirror, they were shaking hands or something; whoever was in jag never got out, it was all through the window."

The young officer sat up as if he had had an epiphany. "Bugger, they could be drug dealers. That's why it looked odd."

The older officer got on his radio. "Would you like a cup of tea, or coffee?" asked Rebecca. "I would offer you a brandy, but," she said as she got up. It was obvious she was shaking and it looked like several emotions were battling within her.

"I would like a tea, please, Mrs Davis," said the younger. "No sugar; as my wife says, I'm sweet enough," he added with a little grin. The older officer asked for a coffee with three sugars, as it seemed half the squad thought he was too sour as it was. They were pleased to see a small smile appear on the woman's face. It was an old trick, but one used to try to help prevent someone from going into shock. It seem to work; Mrs Davis looked at them and smiled.

"I suppose one of you needs to use the bathroom as well, do you?"

The older officer smiled. "You caught onto all our tricks." He shook his head ruefully. "How about this: Ouch, ouch, I got a cramp; do you mind if I walk around a bit?"

Alan burst out laughing. "I hate to say this, but if you look upstairs,  
we're all packed. We booked a holiday before my wife even knew Harry existed. We were going to cancel it if nothing new happened with him, as she seems to be to involved with this child's case. I know she was there a lot, and so please, look around; we won't say anything."

A squawk on the radio made the older officer look up. "Sir, it seems as though some surveillance from the area you mentioned shows you going past, and the van used in the kidnapping in the shot."

Rebecca came through with the drinks. "Mrs Davis, from what your husband told us, one of our officers has got some CCTV of the van used; I don't know all the details, but it seems you are already helping us." They took their glasses and the younger one smiled.

"Your husband said we could have a look round, and you were going away.  
Going anywhere nice?"

She smiled. "We watch enough cop shows to know that you lot would like to look around; anyone who has been around a victim or a suspect, or anyone to do with an ongoing investigation knows that.

"Not really anywhere interesting," she went on. "We're going to Albania;  
I'm going to see how their social work system is, and my husband wants to go to a place that isn't PC this, mobile that, microwave this. So as it's mainly rural areas, we decided to try there." She got up and fetched the plane tickets from top of the cupboard, handing them to the younger officer. "See? Booked months ago, and I didn't know of Harry for three weeks after they were booked." There was no malice in her tone.

"You know my job; I've been on your side of the table. If I was with you, I would be suspicious of a missing child, so I can hardly condone you for doing what I would do. You will be told to report to your CO,  
then maybe sent to re-interview my husband. Then you'll find out we're gone and you can't find us. I would be bloody suspicious myself."

Alan got up. "Come on," he said to the younger officer. Leading him from the room and up the stairs, he showed him the two bedrooms. The fact that the house had three and one was hidden by magic was never noticed.

In the living room, Rebecca got up and got a notepad and pen. She wrote her and her husband's mobile numbers on it. "Please phone us if you hear anything," she said. "Or better yet, send us a text message, as I don't know the coverage will be like. We would stay even if it meant a loss of money, but in all honesty, how could we help? All I know is in my notes at work, and all my husband knows is on that CCTV footage. In fact, more than my husband knows is on the CCTV, as you're able see the van and license plate number, maybe even faces."

The young officer came back. "I've been in all the rooms and nothing's up there but some luggage." He laughed. "He even made me look under the bed in case you had him hidden there."

"I only hope I get a text message sometime today saying he well," said Rebecca.

As the officers drove off a few minutes later, a nosey neighbor come over; she soon had the entire story. Sadly, it was to cost her as it was another Harry Potter moment. After the unfortunate witch told the story to Albus Dumbledore, she was sent to Albania by the Order of the Phoenix and poor women became another victim of He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named. Not that Rebecca knew Matilda Baghurst was a witch; just that she was a retired minister or teacher or something.

It was all well and good that they were going to Albania, but that was only till they could go to Atlantis. Dobby was upstairs caring for Hedwig and Harry when he noticed something shimmer in the corner. It wasn't much, but it shouldn't have been there. He pointed his finger at it and said in a low, deadly tone that no one would believe came from a house elf: "Show yourself, or I will destroy you."

He nearly jumped when Fawkes appeared, but his instincts and Oath acted faster and the phoenix was immediately encased in a cage. It made a sad song, then looked right at Harry and cried. Dobby dropped the shielded cage and Fawkes flew to Harry, sitting on his shoulder.

"No, must not till we're away. Then if you—" Dobby stopped suddenly. He was a house elf and, as such, was an expert on bonds; he saw the bonds between Hedwig and Harry, and Fawkes and Harry. He was stunned and sat down in the middle of the floor.

He was still sitting there an hour later when Rebecca and Alan came in.  
Seeing him on the floor and a weird-looking bird on Harry, they immediately went on the attack.

"Stop!" Dobby hollered. "We're all his friends!"

This pulled everyone up short. "What is that bird?" Rebecca asked. "And why are you sitting on the floor?"

"It was Dumbledore's phoenix." At this, they looked at the bird hard.

"Was?"

"Yes, was. It has broken its bond with Dumbledore and has bonded with Harry Potter."

Alan looked up from the bird. "How often do animals break their bond? I mean, if it brakes the new bond and goes back to Dumbledore, we're screwed."

Dobby clicked his fingers and a book of magical animals floated in front of Alan; he cracked it open and turned to "Phoenix." "A phoenix only bonds with those of pure heart and is the most loyal of all creatures of the light," Alan read. "They can carry a huge amount of weight; their songs can bring joy or fear, depending on whether a good or evil person hears it. Their tears can heal nearly any wound. No person who has had a phoenix for a familiar has had it leave them. Rumour has it only someone who has started to walk the dark path will lose their phoenix."

They all sat down. "Dumbledore's gone bad," Rita said, coming into the room. No one was sure she was there until she had spoke; no one had heard her or seen her come in. "I told the paper I was going on holiday to Albania," she said by way of explanation.

The trip was the last piece of the puzzle that would convince Dumbledore where Harry had appeared. The fact that a worker who had visited Harry a lot was going there and the fact that Rita Skeeter was abruptly going there as well meant that Dumbledore would send a misinformed Matilda there as well. They spent the next few hours getting ready and to the airport.

Albus was not happy Fawkes had disappeared, and he wasn't sure when he had gone, but that wasn't the worst of it. Oh, no, he had lost his temper calling for the overgrown chicken; when Minnie and Filius had walked in, he hadn't noticed them, so he never knew how much they had heard.

He hadn't seen them leave, either. Minerva and Filius went back downstairs, sat down, and stared at each other.

"He had it under the Imperious," Minerva said. "I knew he was powerful,  
but an Imperious on a phoenix?"

It sent a shudder through them both. "He told me in Harry's first year not to listen to him, and he ended up facing Quirrell alone," Filius said. (It should be noted that Dumbledore never told his staff that Tom Riddle had taken up residence in the back of Quirrell's head.) "Luna came to me and said Harry needed help, but I never listened in his second year."

As one, they said: "He fought Riddle—you don't think?" Even as they spoke, they knew it was true. It seemed as though Dumbledore had cost the Potter family everything; he had set up Black and the Longbottoms.  
It was inescapable. Albus Dumbledore batted for the other team? Filius would bet as a nine sickle note that he was untrustworthy, to say the least.

Of course, with this revelation, another Potter moment happened. As they were both angry and in shock, they didn't realise they had their wands in hand.

"I swear," Filius said heatedly, "if—when Harry Potter is found and comes back, I will protect him from the machinations of that wanker! And anyone else who tries to hurt him!"

"If those bastards try to hurt that boy again, I swear," Minerva added,  
"I will join you in hexing them to Hell!"

There was a double flash and they realised what had happened: They had sworn to help Harry. They looked down at their wands—"Bugger"—and they blacked out.

It is also amusing to note that maybe at one time, the power of love was an unknown power, but now it was changed. If indeed it ever had been.

When they woke up, they looked sheepishly at each other. "Shall we go see the good Headmaster?" Minerva asked. "To see if he has any news."

"Why, what a wonderful idea, Minnie dear, and maybe ask about Fawkes while we're at it."

Away they went. They met up with an irate Poppy and all three made their way up the stairs to knock on Dumbledore's door.

"Come in, Professor McGonagall, Professor Flitwick, Madam Pomfrey."

The door opened and a happy-faced headmaster sat behind the desk a twinkle in his eyes. (It might have been handy, but all three were good enough at Occlumancy so as not to be affected by them, and he wasn't in mood for another stay in the hospital.)

"From your smile, I hope you've found Harry, Headmaster," Poppy said.

The smile vanished. "No, sadly not, Madam Pomfrey, but I had an excellent idea. I retrieved Hedwig and gave her to Dobby, and as we speak, they are popping all over the floo network, so that if she gets even a faint—"

The fire flashed suddenly and an irate Ron Weasley appeared with an equally irate Ginny. "Have you finished with my owl yet?" shouted Ron.

"Where is my husband-to-be?" Ginny added. "And Mum wants her money soon;  
things are tight without it."

Dumbledore tried to shut them up, but unfortunately for him, it was another Harry moment; they thought he was trying to fob them off with more excuses. It was also a shame that the other three people in the room were not in the Dumbledore fan club.

"Please, I'm busy, can't—" Dumbledore tried nervously.

"No it bloody can't wait!" Ron interrupted. "I gave Ginny Pig when you gave me Potter's owl. I want to send a letter and she won't let me use Pig, and as Errol was so old, we had him for supper the other night"  
His eyes glazed over. "Roast owl, hum, maybe after Hedwig's delivered my mail, you could get Potter back here to sign the contract as his legal guardian and say he has to marry Ginny. With his money, I could get a new owl, or even a falcon!"

If Professor Snape had been there, he might have deducted house points,  
or might have had a go at the Weasleys; unfortunately, he was in several piles around the Forbidden Forest, adding to the circle of life—or as others would say, he was fertilizer. It may be of note that his good friend Albus still didn't know he was missing, even though he had been dead several days.

McGonagall's "What the fucking hell have you done now, you bastard"  
sort of tipped Ron and Ginny off that they were in trouble; the three hexes that hit the headmaster were also a big clue. It didn't help when an hour and twenty-two minutes later, several Aurors led by Nymphadora Tonks came and arrested Ron, Ginny, and Molly Weasley. The twins, Bill,  
Percy, and Charlie were not about, and Arthur had been arrested at work.  
It was rather funny, but after Percy had read all about Harry Potter,  
and after some digging around, he had stopped being a kiss-up and actually decided that if his family was going to get a good name, it would take hard work. With the twins and some money from Bill and Charlie, he had helped start a joke mailing service.

At the time of the arrests, he and the twins were going over their books to see if it was time to open an account at Gringotts; Charlie was in Romania, working with his dragons and teaching Norbert to act like a horse. (Hagrid still went to see Norbert each school holiday; he was also there at the time of the arrests, shouting encouragements to Charlie and offering Norbert treats when he was well behaved.)

If anyone could get an honest answer from Charlie, he would have said a dragon and his mum both had a lot in common: Both were over-protective with children, both were very loud, and both loved gold and shiny things. He might, after a few drinks, admit to being embarrassed that she was his mum, as he could find very few positive things to say about her other than that she was an excellent actress. He might also have shown some of the letters he had kept to prove to Harry that he had nothing to do with her machinations, if it ever come to that. She was family, after all, and he couldn't grass on her, but if he got dragged into something, like a true Weasley, he would make sure his ass was covered.

He had been surprised when Percy and the twins had tapped him for some cash, and when they explained why they wanted it, he had coughed up.  
Unlike his mother, they had paid him back two weeks later plus a small amount extra as a thank you. Bill, on the other hand, had been kicked out of the family. Oh, they acted nice around outsiders, but the fact that he wouldn't sneak a few coins out now and then for his poor, dear old mother hadn't gone down well. Then the fact that he always seemed to have a new girlfriend, not all of whom had money, annoyed his mother;  
the fact that he dated halfies made it all the worse. The time his mother had turned up unannounced and a half-naked half-goblin woman had answered the door was too much for her. When she come round to a half-dressed son, her normal screaming had no effect than to other prompt Bill to say, "Well, she has money, Mum."

Before Molly could fire back, he carried on. "I know she has, as I just paid her 10 gallons for a shag." She swooned again; he sent her home by going to a floo, calling the Burrow, and shoving her through. That had been the last time they had spoke, at least until she and Ron and Ginny had tried to get their claws into Harry. Like a good Weasley, he had distanced himself from them and made sure that if anything came of it,  
his ass would be covered. Like Charlie, he had been surprised by the twins' and Percy's request for cash, but unlike Charlie, they had come to him face to face and shown him the prospectus Percy had done. They had shown what they were planning and how they planned to do it, and like Charlie, he had been paid back a couple weeks later with a bonus.

When he got a letter about business accounts and such, he had helped them out again, as it looked like the twins and Percy were making a dash for freedom as well. The bonus was how their mum had slagged off the twins and their jokes. If it made money, then when they rubbed her face in it, as they had promised Bill they would, they would invite him to watch. The "You take after that useless farther of yours" remark she often made would come back to haunt her; he made money, even if she took it off him, and they would make money too, but she wouldn't get her claws into it.

It was funny; with all their precautions, they hadn't really needed any of them as no one knew as much as they thought they did. When the whole family had been rounded up, each was questioned under Veratiserum, and all bar Ron, Ginny, and Molly were found innocent. The fact that it turned out Molly was dosing Arthur with a mild form of liquid Imperious was a shock to all bar, yet again, Ron and Ginny. They got the distinction of being the youngest people ever sent to Azkaban, but as their mother was there as well, they could call it a family trip.  
Molly's boat had sailed; she had a chance to get some money, but instead of a vault, the boat ended at Azkaban. All in all, not the destination she would have chosen.

Sadly, their arrival announced Pettigrew's departure; in his animagus form, he held onto the side of the boat and then left with it.  
Unfortunately for Matilda Bagshot, he decided to go to the Daily Prophet to catch up on the news where he heard that Rita Skeeter was going hunting in Albania for a missing Harry Potter. This had the unfortunate outcome of Pettigrew taking a soul anchour and following her to Albania,  
where Riddle came back to life at the same time that Martha died; well,  
it would be the same time, as he performed a soul swap and sent her soul to Hell in his soul's place.

Wormtail, being incompetent, performed the ritual such that Riddle ended up looking like a slug instead of a feared Dark Lord. Karma was pissed off; with Harry Potter in a coma, she was having to use good will that should go to him on others. Technically it should be spread, good and bad, but James Potter had dumped her for Lilly and she had never quite gotten over it. When they died, she decided, much like Snape, to take her bitterness out on their son.

The saying "Karma sucks" (often used by evil people who suddenly have a run of bad luck) was wrong; she didn't suck at all. That was why James had dumped her. The trouble was, she didn't know that two prophecies and her pissed-off mother and two aunts were now working against her (her mother was one of the three fates). Her day was about to get worse: A knock came at the astral cottage door.

"Shit, Dad, do you have to wear your work uniform when you come here?  
What would happen if my boyfriend were here, you would have killed him"  
She went white. "OK, I know he would die, but seeing you would give anyone a coronary."

A deep, booming voice came from inside an impossibly black hood. "If you had a lover here, then I am sure your aunt would cut his life string. We told you, after what you did to Harry Potter with the Basilisk and refusing to clear his godfather's name, you were grounded." Death paused for dramatic effect. "You—sorry, I'm a bit miffed," he said,  
embarrassed. "You see this?" He held up an hour glass; it was warped and looked wrong. "Shit, oops—umm…." Two red dots appeared in the hood.  
"Yes, I see you do. This is your fault; instead of Riddle dying, your messing has cursed others to die who should have had more time."

Karma looked up indignantly. "Why's it always my fault?"

"Who messed with Lilly Potter's life? It was supposed to be a father's love, and Harry was supposed to grow up with a mother but no father"  
The cowl shook. "But no, you had to make sure she died as well, then the poor child was tortured for years."

Karma frowned. "How the hell you work that out?"

"He was supposed to fight James, and James was supposed to kill him.  
Riddle's father hated him; he never knew what a loving father was. He was supposed to stun James, then go after Lilly and Harry; then at some point James would get between mother and child and the curse would kill them both. A father who loved his wife and child would make a double sacrifice shield, but no, you made him so pissed off that he killed James /and/ Lilly. Either way, it should have ended there, but now, why was he pissed off?"

"Hum, don't know, Daddy," Karma said, getting rather upset.

"Because Pettigrew had buggered up a soul stealer stone," Death snapped,  
"and instead of sucking a soul out, it held it as an anchour so he couldn't gain any extra power from sucking other magical souls and magic out of them."

Karma backed away. Daddy was warming up and that was never good; the two red light looked like lasers. "So then he goes and gets hit with a rebounded death curse and his soul is partially sucked into the soul stone in his pocket, but as James Potter is already in place, only part of his soul stayed out and the rest was trapped. Then when his servant Quirrell started at Hogwarts, he used unicorn blood and his old diary to nearly reform his body."

Karma moved farther back as her father walked into the hallway; this did not bode well. "While he was trying for the Philosopher's Stone and unicorn blood, he made a new soul catcher or two in case this happened again. Bloody Quirrell's half soul blocked his full absorption; with the diary, most of Ginevra Weasley's soul got sucked in and instead of being a nice, kind, loving girl, she become a heartless, money-grubbing shrew."

Karma was against a wall and Daddy still advanced. "He has no godfather,  
no money, and is insane. You know your job; if he does good, he gets a good reward. If he does bad, then he gets bad luck. Giving him the fucking Dursley karma on top of his own was—well. The big man wants you upstairs as soon as we have had a chat."

She would have fainted, but she was too scared to even do that. If the headman wanted her, she was in so deep that a couple of galaxies piled on top of her head wouldn't even reach the top of the hole she was in.  
She gulped.

"Look at this," Death went on. "Matilda Baghurst's soul in Tom Riddle's hour glass, along with James Potter's, Quirinus Quirrell's, part of Ginevra Weasley's, and several others he killed to make more sodding soul anchors!" Karma wished she wasn't karma because just then, her knee bent and she proceeded to try and kick her own ass. Why the hell did someone come up with that idea, she wondered ("Everything goes fine,  
then karma kicks you in the ass": Another saying that evil people used)  
Death glared at her. "You best hop to it fast; after you see the boss,  
your mother and aunts want a word. If there is anything left of you after that, we shall discuss your punishment."

A very subdued Karma walked past her father. He shook his head and left,  
wondering why he couldn't have a normal family.

Our hero slept on. The Davis family had a nice flight; a few drinks, a rest in the hotel, and they generally did as married couples away from home do, blissfully unaware of the chaos happening all over due to a small child's mental breakdown.

Two days after they got to Albania, the Davises had a visit from Dobby.

"We're ready to move him now, everything is set. The place we're putting him is and Rita's here now, so we all can go." Dobby was bouncing on his toes; this was taking too long for his liking.

"Dobby, Rita needs a day's rest and she needs to be seen wondering around here," Rebecca said. "We will go tomorrow. You can move Hedwig and Fawkes and all equipment we're going to need."

Dobby's eyes got big. ""OK!" Off he went with a small pop. Alan put his head up from under the blankets.

"Well, Love, can we get back to what we were doing?"

She smiled. "Of course," and she pushed his head back under the blankets.

Some time later, a knock came at the door; it was Rita. "How's it going?" she said by way of greeting. "Ready for a night on the town?  
Dobby's in a rush, but as I told him if I'm not seen at least talking to you then it won't work. I'll be at the local hot spot." She gave them the name and left.

Some two hours later, they turned up to the place she had specified and another hour later, they were in a chat with Rita. When they left,  
swerving and rather loudly drunk and, the mention of the poor boy called Harry was heard no less than nine times on the way back to the hotel.  
They booked out in the morning and went to local swimming bath; there,  
they met Dobby and Fawkes, who shuttled them to the next location.

"I don't see why we have to jump here, there, and everywhere," said an irritated Alan after their third jump.

"Because it's too far for a single jump," Rebecca chastised. "We need to be near a gate, then we can get there. Plus, house elves don't typically transport people as it's a lot of hard work, and he needs to rest."

Dobby looked sad. "I could take Rita in one trip in her bug form, but you're a muggle so I need use my magic more. Fawkes will only carry those sworn to Harry Potter, so he gets your wife." Alan looked a bit upset, as it seemed it was his fault it was taking so long.

"Do not worry, Alan this is the last stop; the next one is the gateway."

Unused to so much teleportation in such a small amount of time, Rita had been wavering in and out of consciousness during the trip; as she came round, she knew she wasn't dreaming when she saw she was in the Department of Mysteries with the execution veil in front of her.

"Rita, Rita, come on, we don't have a lot of time."

Rita pointed her hand at the veil. "That's used to execute criminals"  
Her hand was shaking nearly non-stop.

Dobby smiled at her. "Yes it would kill, as it's set to go to space, not to Atlantis. I need to set it to Atlantis, then reset it to space when I come back so no one knows we've been here."

Dobby waved his hand over several icons and the weird mirror effect was lost. Instead a lovely panorama view of a rich-looking room showed up.  
Dobby stepped through the portal, then Alan and Rebecca. Rita cast a quick look round, held her breath, and ran at it. As she entered at the same speed she had left, she tripped over her sister, who had fallen into Alan, who had stopped as the shock of instant transportation hit him. There was no cold, no weird light…. Just a normal step from room to room.

"Got to reset it now!" Dobby popped away; a few seconds later, the veil behind them looked like a weird mirror and a loud POP announced Dobby's return.

"Dobby needs sleep…." and the loyal house elf passed out, leaving three very confused adults trying to sort themselves out. A new elf appeared;  
he had a beard, wore clothes, and looked very old. He spoke some words of a strange language.

"Sorry," Rita said, "we don't understand you."

The elf went over to Dobby and touched his head. A glow appeared in its eyes and a faint glimmer came through Dobby's eyelids. "He will sleep for awhile. I am what you would call the chamberlain; please, follow me."

Rebecca went over to Dobby and made as to pick him up. "That will not be necessary," the chamberlain said, and with a point of his finger, Dobby floated up and was towed behind the old elf.

The humans looked in wonder at the wizard tapestries, beautiful furniture, and antiques. A large door with an ornate handle swung open and a small elf looked out; she looked at Dobby and ran over to him. She and the chamberlain had a quick chat in the unknown language and she took Dobby away with her. As the humans followed, they saw Harry lying on a bed. Fawkes launched himself off Rebecca's shoulder and flew to Harry's; Rita looked at the female elf and went over to her.

"I don't understand you. Can you do the same as the chamberlain and learn our language, please?"

A laugh echoed through the room. "If she could understand you, she would have been speaking your language. You might of been telling her a recipe for Quidditch pie for all she knows." That set the elf off again. He wandered over to the female and placed her hand over Rita's forehead. A look of extreme distaste appeared on the female elf's face.

"If you hadn't mended your ways, you would have been evicted from here and mind-wiped." The old chamberlain looked at her and they conversed in their language for awhile.

"You may stay here and we shall see if we can help him," she said as she pointed to Harry.

The Sorting Hat spoke up: "I am called the Sorting Hat. I was created over a thousand years ago by the four founders of Hogwarts; I have a small piece of each of them in me. You could say I am a living Penseive.  
How may I help? We had planned on putting me on Harry's head; maybe with him holding the sword of Gryffindor, together we could break through to him and bring him from his madness. If you have any ideas, please, share them with us."

The female looked at the hat. "Sit over there and we will talk. I don't want you disturbing my patients." She took a breath. "I am the head healer and I suppose, in your language, I would be called 'The Phoenix'  
As we are both healers and all my family are healers in some way or other, it might get confusing; please call that phoenix by her name and refer to me as Pheone."

A table and some drinks appeared. "Please help yourselves," said the chamberlain. "It's perfectly safe for humans."

Pheone looked at the humans. "Now, do you want to verbally share your memories or do a public share? That way, all house elves here and all of you can see them. The verbal takes longer but is private; the public isn't private but it is a lot faster and will show any details you might have missed."

They chatted amongst themselves. "We have decided that as Dobby trusts you, and as we need your help, it would be unwise to share privately"  
Rebecca announced after awhile. "A public one will give more people a chance to come to us with ideas. So we want a public one." She paused and looked at Pheone. "First, though, could you tell us about here and—"

Pheone suddenly stood up and went over to Dobby, gave him a drink, and came back. "You were saying?"

"Well, I was wondering…. Are you aliens?"

The laughter was massive and before it stopped, the chamberlain and Pheone was both on the floor clutching their eyes and curling up.

"I guess it was something you said, Love," Alan said, shaking his head,  
"but I can't see what's so funny myself."

The two elves eventually stopped laughing and got control of themselves.  
"May we," a small giggle, "share that with the others, please"  
Nonplussed, the humans nodded in agreement. Pheone went to a small hat and stuck it on her head, and a light flashed under it; she took it off,  
but not before laughing some more. It took all of 15 seconds before the humans heard the first echoes of laughter outside; after 20 minutes, it seemed to be coming from all over and was quite loud.

"OK, what's so funny?" Rebecca asked when the laughter died down.

"We must call a historian so you can understand," Pheone said. "Please wait; it shouldn't be long."

Barely two breaths later, a young elf appeared; he put his hand to his head and said, "Sorry I took so long; I was at the back of the archives when that last memory was shown. I was unlucky enough to be on top of a ladder and fell."

Alan looked thoughtful. "Would it be easy to give everyone one of our memories so that you can all learn our language at once instead of one at a time?"

The chamberlain looked up at him and shrugged. "You can if you want; it might be a little faster, but not by much, as I doubt many will be needed to help you."

You could almost hear the Harry Potter moment hit him as soon as them words were finished. "Come, Alan, put this on and we will use your language skills."

Alan looked confused. "But I'm not magical."

This had the unfortunate side effect of setting off a new set of laughs.  
"Please can I share this one?" said a near-hysterical archivist. With Alan's nod, the place soon filled with more laughter.

"Is it me, or is this getting old?" Rita asked. "What the hell's so funny?"

"Well, as this place is a myth, maybe they're so starved for entertainment that they find simple comments amusing?" Alan shrugged. "I don't know, maybe it's just their brand of humour."

The archivist historian looked away from where Alan's memories were playing. "Nope, wrong on both accounts."

15 seconds later, the laughter was near deafening. Alan walked to a window and shouted over the noise, "What's so bloody funny!"

It took nearly two hours for the sound to die down. "Alan," the archivist started, "it takes an elf of roughly the same age as you nearly 17 hours to down all of their memories; it took you 15 seconds.  
We just realised how well your creator's work had gone."

The three humans looked startled. "Our what?" asked a scared Rita.  
Pheone got up and went to Dobby and Harry to check on them.

"I am the archivist and historian, so I shall tell you," said the archivist. "Please call me Archie.

"Long ago, we lived on Earth; mind you, we didn't call it Earth, we just called it home."

"Wait, are you saying we're not on the planet earth?" Alan cut in at the same time that Rebecca interrupted: "What do you mean, we? Humans and house elves, or just house elves?" Rita said nothing; she had fainted again.

"Silence!" the chamberlain shouted. "And /never/ use the term 'house elf' here!"

They all turned to the chamberlain. "Sorry," the two humans muttered.  
After bringing Rita around, Archie continued.

"All of what you call 'magical creatures' were abundant, and some that you may never have heard of or know only as myths lived with us. Then they came; the Jokers, as they liked to call themselves." He shook his head. "They asked if they could try an experiment; they wanted new joke customers in the future, as they lived on laughter and happiness. We agreed."

"Dementors!" Rita suddenly shrieked. "It's your fault Dementors are on Earth!" Confused, Archie asked what a bloody Dementor was; this lead to Rita's memories being played. 18 seconds later, there wasn't much laughing and you could almost cut the tension with a knife.

"Those are not the Jokers," Archie said. "They should never have been allowed on our planet. This will have to be rectified." The elves looked to Harry Potter. "It seems as if you, young child, shall have to purge them from our world as it seems you have had the most effect against them. This isn't something that we can decide upon." He shook his head.  
"The Jokers didn't feed that way; happiness and laughter produces a chemical from the brain and that chemical is put into the air." He shook his head again. "It's so hard making a simple thing simpler so you lot can understand it.

"OK, you know that when a bee stings it releases a chemical, and that chemical attracts more bees to help fight?"

Rebecca nodded. "Pheromones, right."

The elf smiled. "Yes; what laughter releases isn't a pheromone, but it's close enough for you."

Rita looked puzzled. "What?"

"Oh boy, that sure didn't work out well," laughed the chamberlain. "OK,  
OK, the really dumb version, geez." Rita looked offended at this but he carried on. "Some things smell certain ways, and only things of the same species can smell them. When you laugh, you give off a smell. The Jokers eat that smell. Like a whale filters plankton." Pheone was on the floor trembling from her silent mirth as she listened in. "When they eat, as it has already left your body, it doesn't harm you in any way. These Dementors, as you call them, steal and basically rape your brain; they and the Jokers are not even distantly related or alike."

He took a swig of his drink. "The Jokers watched the animals on our world and decided to make some of them future victims of their pranks.  
As they wanted as much food as possible, they made it easy to prank humans and also to make them have a sense of humour, and to be inventive and inquisitive." Here he shook his head. "We told them to use something like a dog, but no, they liked the way the monkeys played; they messed with their genome sequence." Rita's glazed look was all he needed to know he was speaking above her level.

"They made a potion the monkeys drank, and after a long time, they were transfigured into humans." Rita looked happy as now she could follow the story.

"Where's Harry Potter!"

They all jumped and spun around; Dobby was sitting up in bed, his head swinging from side to side.

"He's around here, young one," called Pheone. "Sit there till I check you over."

Five seconds later, Dobby was next to Harry with a clean bill of health.  
He walked over to the chamberlain. "May I show my memories, please? I think all need to see them."

The chamberlain thought it over. "They are learning the history of their home world, or 'Earth,' as they call it, so why don't we watch them while they learn?" Then he sniggered.

Dobby sat down and said in a quiet voice, "Please stop what you are doing and watch my memories." He waited four seconds, as that was plenty of time, and placed the little hat on his head. Three hours later, there were some very pissed off elves and some very confused elves, but mainly there were a lot of elves who had decided that Harry Potter was "The One."

While Dobby was showing his memories, Rita, Rebecca, and Alan were learning the history of the human race and more. Archie waited till Dobby started to show his memories, then continued his stories.

"They knew the race would look to the stars and want to travel them, and knew that with all the things that flew, it would take awhile, but after they started living in communities and travel became more important, it wouldn't take too long. They popped back every so often to see how things were progressing. The—" A "bong, bong, bong" sound interrupted him mid-word. A gas cloud appeared. For a few minutes, nothing happened,  
but then:

"Sorry that took so long; I was just catching up with my friends. I was passing by and felt a huge amount of laughter, so I went for a meal."

Archie looked from the creature to the humans. "This is a Joker; its name is unpronounceable by your type, so just call it Jester."

Rita looked confused. "When did it catch up? And how did it learn our language? And it's not very nice to call a friend an 'it'."

That was it for the three elves; their laughter erupted again. The cloud started to pulsate and soon, "bong, bong, bong"; a second and third Joker appeared. Within seconds, they all pulsed with a faint glow.

"Oh, keep her; with her here, we could feed my species!"

Rita wasn't happy being made fun of. The irony of the fact that prior to her conversion, that was exactly what she had done to others was a small, unimportant point to her.

"They can read minds, and so can we, so we communicated in each other's minds. This makes it faster and more accurate; they are androgynous,  
reproducing by splitting themselves, and when two smaller ones meet,  
they join together to make another adult Joker, so it is an accurate description for someone of your intelligence."

One of the Jokers spoke up: "I think your race was right; we should have gone for the dogs."

The cloud referred to as Jester seemed to smile; then, all of a sudden,  
all the Jokers changed colour as a gasp ran through Atlantis. Dobby's memories had just gotten up to house elf hunting and using heads as trophies. The very aroma of the thoughts was enough to make the Jokers vanish before they fainted. Archie tried to carry on from where he had left off, but he couldn't; the memories coming from Dobby were too evil.

"This is hard on us, what Dobby is showing us," he said. "Please take a bed and get some rest. We shall talk later." 


	6. Chapter 6

I do not own anthing you know from the canon, the rest is mine --------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Chapter Six -----------------

The humans knew something was bad and they knew that, by the look of it,  
the human race would soon face a reckoning. They chose beds and soon all three were in a troubled sleep. It was a Harry Potter moment.

Well, maybe the term "Harry Potter moment" should be explained: It is a moment in time that will impact Harry Potter. For example, when he met Draco Malfoy for the first time, and when he met Ron Weasley for the first time, both could have had better outcomes. Or when Vernon Dursley decided to take his impotence out on "the freak" Harry Potter. Very few Harry Potter moments had been good for Harry; now others were having them (due to Karma's telling off and subsequent spanking, grounding, and of all the horrors, having her mobile confiscated. You had to feel sad,  
in a way, for the poor sap who pissed her off next and got what he deserved in spades). Other Harry Potter moments included the times it hit him that he was alone; for example, when he was locked in his cupboard, facing a reincarnated Dark Lord (twice), facing over 100 Dementors…. You get the idea good.

This particular Harry moment was, first, when the elves found out what was happening to their kin; second, that two prophecies mentioned the child; three, that the boy, when he awoke, would be powerful, but his sanity would be questionable. The elf prophecy was a bit disconcerting and when the head archivist found the original one after nearly one hour's search, the elves could begin to get an idea of its age; they started to discuss it. Here it comes:

"I, the Grand High Elf, say this: If Harry Potter is the Chosen One to lead us back home to help heal it, I say we swear, as a race, to help him!" (Told you so; in a Harry Potter moment, everything works out as an extreme.) He looked around. "All those in favour?"

It was unanimous. "So mote it be!" The aftershock from countless house elves and other elves was so great, the planet Earth had an unexpected number of earthquakes. As a side note, just before the earthquakes,  
Draco Malfoy had hit and badmouthed his mum, then kicked and badly injured a house elf, as he had been told that with his dad in prison, he couldn't get his allowance. Sadly, as he was caught in a Harry Potter moment created by the elves, and Karma was sitting waiting to get some karma on the Malfoys, he really shouldn't have said "You wait, bitch, I shall be more powerful than Harry bloody Potter and shall join my father." He was about to say "Beside the Dark Lord as one of his generals," but Karma and the earthquake meant he didn't get to finish his sentence. As the earthquake hit, it just happened to crack Malfoy mansion, thereby breaking all its charms and causing muggles to see it.  
The Ministry of Magic had to come fix the charms and Obliviate some memories.

This wasn't enough for Karma, though; just by sheer chance, one of the MOM officials found a room under the living room that had been opened in the 'quake and had some of Draco's and Lucius' playthings in it. Some were still alive; two were Aurors who had been missing after Lucius was locked up and, as the door was charmed so that only males could open it,  
Draco got the blame. It didn't matter; he had whipped them and practiced curses on them, but hadn't kidnapped them (Bellatrix and her husband had). No, what mattered was that one of them was engaged to a high-up ministry official.

Karma smiled; in less than 24 hours, she had granted Draco's wish: he was just like his dad, penniless and in Azkaban, and as he was powerless due to the Dementors' presence, he was as powerful as Harry. Hell, he was even having nightmares he couldn't wake up from, just like Harry.

All the elves on Earth had felt the new bond. It was small, and would only come into full force if Harry Potter was the elf Chosen One. The two prophecies smiled. Sometimes it was so easy. All through this, Harry slept, trapped in his nightmare.

Alan woke first sat up and looked around; it took him a few minutes to work out where he was. He got up and looked around in a bit of a panic.  
"Dobby," he called hopefully.

"Yes Alan?"

"Hum, Dobby, where's the toilet here?"

Dobby got a big grin. "We're elves; we don't need a toilet, so there isn't one. Would you like a bowl?"

Alan's face fell and he was about to say something when Dobby burst out with laughter and pointed to a door. "Through there, Alan."

As he ran to the toilet, Alan could have sworn he heard the sound of a lot of laughter. As he did his business, he went white. No paper and no sign of anything to flush. "Oh god, could this get any more embarrassing?" He frowned to himself. "Dobby? How do I—err…wipe and flush?" he called.

"Alan, sit where you are and Dobby show you."

"No! It's okay, just tell me!" He was certain he heard laughter now.

A new voice cut in: "Mr Alan, it's the red button to wipe and the yellow button to flush. Look to your left, they look like two diamonds."

Alan hid his head; the sound of laughter was unmistakable now.

"Honey, are you sure you don't need a hand?" Then, with an audible giggle, "I know what's the matter: he hasn't got his morning reading material."

Then the most embarrassing thing he had ever to endure happened. "It's OK, Dobby brought his Jugs Monthly and his Bouncy Babes. Which one do you want?"

It was too much for Alan. He wanted to vanish, or maybe just die there.  
Unfortunately, he didn't have a Harry moment and as such, he had to eventually leave the toilet as his wife and Rita wanted to use it. He moved over to his wife and whispered in her ear: "Please, can you ask them where the shower is and how to use it?"

She turned to him, ready to refuse, but he looked so sad she nodded and spoke up. "Alan's too embarrassed to ask, but—" Alan gave her a patented death glare, but it was so over-used that she was immune to it "—can you tell him where the bath or shower is and how to use it? Oh, and it might be an idea to tell him how to dry himself." She, Rita, and the elves folded up with laughter and as Alan turned around, there was Dobby with the memory transfer hat on.

"Kill me, kill me now," he groaned.

Dobby looked over. "We won't kill you. The Jokers are here. Yesterday my memories made them ill, so today I must feed them and make them well as a balance in life."

All of a sudden, Alan started to laugh. "I can't believe it," he choked out. Soon he had tears running down his face. When he had control of himself, he simply said: "They made us to be gullible and a source of food, and I just fed how many? Just by going to the toilet." He started laughing again. "I hate to see how many turn up when I want to cook breakfast," and he was off again.

"No sir," the chamberlain said, "we can't let you cook while you're here." Alan took that to mean that as he was a guest, the elves would cook for him—that is, until the chamberlain carried on. "Until we have checked to make sure we are protected."

After a nice breakfast of fish and fruit, they got serious. The hat and sword were brought over at once.

"We were thinking, our memory caps, as you call them, might be an idea;  
if we can see what he is seeing, we might be able to help."

"No, no, no!" Everyone turned to Dobby. "That is a bad idea! He has far worse memories than Dobby—it might be enough to kill a Joker."

The air shimmered and a Joker appeared. "Can they truly be that bad? We are experts on thoughts and memories; we might be able to help."

Dobby looked sad. "Dementors." Rita shuddered and the Joker moved away.  
"See?" Dobby went on. "Just the name gives the air a bad taste. If you go into his mind, he has seen many more than her." He pointed to Rita.

The Joker pulsed. "I can see his memories with the metaphysical temporal displacement."

"What?" Alan cut in.

The Joker said simply, "The funny hat to show memories."

Rebecca pinned her gaze to the Joker. "We never did hear all the history of your people and mine."

The Joker shimmered. "The long story is complicated; the simple story is that we came, made friends with the elves, created you by messing with your blood, then every so often, we came to see how much closer you were to joining us in the stars. We showed Icarus and his father how to fly and when we next came, you were all still on horseback and no one was flying. Then we helped da Vinci and guess what? Still no flight. This is the first time since we helped da Vinci that we have been in the area and we find that you're still not in space but you can blow up islands!  
I guess the joke was on us in the end."

Alan leaned his head back. "Bugger, you said we were made stupid so we could be pranked, but it seems that we're dumber than I thought."

"Yes, that you can't even wipe your own bum at 30 shows that," Dobby said. It was too much and the Jokers fed well.

After a long discussion, it was decided the other Jokers would go away and one would remain; he would not feed, as then he would sense the emotions and thoughts but not actually feed from them. The hats were placed on Harry's head the sword in his hand; the Joker just seemed to surround him.

"Dobby, you can touch him if you want; it won't hurt me." So Dobby reached through and held Harry's hand. "It's no point in you, Alan, or Rita holding onto him, as he doesn't know you. I am sorry." Hedwig and Fawkes took flight and landed each one on one of his shoulders,  
seemingly daring the cloud to send them away. Nothing seemed to happen as they watched but the occasional shifting of a wing or change of colour.

With the aid of the Joker, they went back to Harry's earliest memory.  
Sadly, it was Riddle killing his mum as she begged for Harry's life.  
They all shuddered; to be less than two years old and to remember such a thing…. Once they had worked out comparative age differences, it went from abuse to starvation to pain and suffering, then betrayal. Even if,  
on a conscious level, he knew he had been betrayed, on a subconscious one, he knew it to a terrible degree. He needed friends and something,  
or somewhere, he could belong to. As each horror of the child's life hit them with all the emotions felt on both levels of consciousness, they were staggered.

After an hour, they all pulled away. Dobby was physically sick and the Joker looked a strange colour. "We got as far as his eleventh birthday,  
as that's where Dobby says his life got hard," the Joker said.

Rita was helping Dobby and patting his back. If birds could cry and shriek and rant about unfairness, Hedwig would have done so.

"We can't take anymore today," the Joker went on. "Dobby was right—if we had gone in and had left any chance of his memories feeding us, it might have killed one or more of us."

This statement shocked them all. "You mean you haven't gotten to the bad stuff—only his childhood before Hogwarts, and it's that bad?" Rebecca asked.

In there own ways, Fawkes, Hedwig, Dobby, and the Joker each said yes.  
"We shall continue tomorrow, and if the worst is yet to come, I think we shall try to watch till his twelfth birthday."

"Thank you for what you have done so far, all of you," Rebecca cried.

"You don't understand," the Joker said. "As bad as we have seen, we haven't covered the worst, or even started to help him. How he has so much kindness and honesty and forgiveness is remarkable, after all he's been through. I shall return tomorrow if I can; if not, another Joker shall take my place. Please make the elves happy; all the elves of Atlantis have reacted the same as Dobby." With that, the Joker faded from view.

For the rest of the day, the humans tried to make the elves happy. They asked to see the city and were shown around on a type of hover board;  
they complemented the elves on gardens, on pottery, on all sorts of things, but nothing seem to lift their spirits.

"I think I should put the hat on."

Alana and Rita turned to Rebecca. "Why?"

"I have a lot of happy memories and very few sad ones," she explained.  
"Maybe I can concentrate on happy ones."

"Dobby thinks it's good idea," Dobby said, passing her the hat. He spoke up to the rest of the elves: "Please, everyone, the human Rebecca is going to try and share her happy memories with us."

Rebecca's memories played out quickly. "Ten seconds," laughed Alan,  
"mine was longer."

Rebecca glared at him. "Yes, but I tried to only show happy things;  
yours was your whole brain. I still had lots left and five seconds spare."

Dobby was bouncing on his toes; Pheone and the chamberlain were as well.  
"You had to go to the hospital after you proposed," Dobby burst out,  
"because you forgot you had a tube of glue in pocket!" He burst out in a fresh round of laughter.

The chamberlain wiped his eyes. "No, the best one was when he got drunk and forgot he was on a boat, and staggered out to go to the toilet and fell overboard. He just can't seem to use a toilet properly unsupervised."

Alan's look of death went completely ignored. "Did you have to show them everything I've done that's stupid?" he asked. Rita was trying image Alan with his legs glued up.

"Well, it seems you cheered the elves up, anyway."

"It's true, it has helped us a lot, and Jester as well. It's obvious we need a way to cheer us all up after each visit into the child's mind"  
Dobby swung round at a hoot from Hedwig and a croon from Fawkes. He made a soft noise as Jester looked on.

"Yes, that would be a good idea." The humans made faces; all present were use to their bewildered expressions. "Hedwig and Fawkes suggest we use some of their memories; as Fawkes is old, he has a lot of good memories, and until Hedwig was illegally given to Ron Weasley, she had some good memories as well. As we all can communicate with them, we can use their memories."

"Birds can talk and think?" Alan asked, earning him stares from the birds and from Rebecca.

"Honey, I seem to remember you calling me a bird more than once."

He sat up straight. "No, no, not human birds—I meant birds with wings"  
This would have been enough to mollify her, but he was trying to cover himself and, as in most cases, he said a bit too much. "And they—females, I mean it's the males who got the brains; they build the nest and stuff." The looks from Pheone, Rita, and Rebecca, while on the "You're so dead" level, were nothing compared to Hedwig. Alan gulped,  
looking around nervously; his patented death glare had been made useless and he was on the receiving end of four "I will make sure you die as I destroy your planet"-level death glares.

"Honey?"

Bugger, bugger, bugger, this was not good. "Yes, Sweetheart?" Please,  
please let me leave this room alive.

"Did you know this place has a swimming pool?" Rebecca asked sweetly.  
"Why don't I get changed and meet you there? Just ask for the directions to Kraken pool. There's a good boy."

Phew, she wasn't too mad. He grabbed a pair of trunks and ran from the room. Those left behind could hear him shouting for directions to the Kraken pool. "Your husband does know what a Kraken is, doesn't he"  
Pheone asked, annoyed.

"Nope," Rebecca said with a smirk, "but he will soon. Females have no brains, indeed." She turned to the chamberlain. "Could you please have someone on standby to rescue him, and maybe show us the memory? Or if it's funny, maybe share it Atlantis-wide."

The chamberlain looked at Pheone. "I knew there was a reason I didn't annoy females; I think I may have just been given a hint!" With that, he burst out laughing and Jester made use of the small meal.

The rest of the day was spent pleasurably by most; Rita was given permission to use her bug form and fly around. As she didn't want to be hit by a fly swat and as the place was almost sterile, she was sure she would be spotted. Rebecca sat reading to Harry, and Fawkes and Hedwig stretched their wings and flew around the place. Only Alan had a bad day; he had found out where the Kraken pool was, and as soon as he saw it, he pulled off his T-shirt, hid behind a plant to change (he couldn't see changing rooms or anyone to ask), and dove in. It would have been a wonderful dive, straight and streamlined, if something hadn't grabbed him mid-air and made him belly flop into the water quickly and painfully. He struggled and he found himself floating up and onto the pool edge; an elf stood there watching him.

"I'm sorry, were you thinking of feeding the Kraken? If so, I can put you back in, or did you not see the danger signs and the warnings?"

"Fe-fee-feed the Kraken."

The elf levitated Alan and made to dump him back into the pool.

"STOP!" Alan screamed. "I was—no, I don't want to feed the Kraken, I wanted to swim. I-I-I-I didn't see the signs." The elf brought him to the edge. "I wanted to go swimming and thought this was—the Kraken—" He stopped mid-sentence. His wife was more pissed than he had thought. He sat down heavily. "Is there a swimming pool around here?"

The elf gave him directions. He got up and went to get his clothes;  
apparently, an ill Kraken undergoing treatment near his impromptu changing spot hadn't been well enough to be in the pool in case it got eaten by a larger Kraken, but had enough strength to eat Alan's clothes.  
"Why me, why me," he kept repeating to himself. If he had known the ill Kraken was female, he may have suspected a conspiracy. If he had seen an annoyed Karma, he would have known it was.

"Females have no brains," she muttered to herself. "Ha." And off she went.

Hedwig and Fawkes flew down corridors and around giant rooms. It was harder for Hedwig, as there were no air currents to use, but she didn't mind; she needed to think, and flying helped her think. There was a flash and a strange phoenix appeared before them.

"You come with the walkers?" Hedwig hooted and Fawkes agreed.

"We are bonded to the ill walker," he said.

"How can you both bond to a walker?"

"He is a—"

Another flash and yet another phoenix appeared. "Streak, what are you"  
The new phoenix stopped and noticed Hedwig and Fawkes. "I am Fireball,  
sister of Streaks." Fawkes introduced himself and Hedwig. "We have a better place for you to fly, Hedwig," Fireball said. "Follow us."

They led them down a couple of corridors, then through a door. It was a wide-open space with a warm breeze and a bright sun.

"This is beautiful, thank you, Streaks, brother of Fireball, and thank you Fireball, sister of Streaks." Hedwig flew as she loved; she did all her hunting and messaging moves. Streaks watched her for awhile, then flew over and started to copy some of her moves.

"So Fawkes, what brings you to Atlantis?" Fireball asked. Fawkes landed and Fireball sat next to him. "Shall we share?"

And it happened again: a Harry moment. What should have been a simple sharing of memory not unlike the elf way (bar it not needing the hat,  
just eye contact) turned into "That miserable excuse for a walker did WHAT?"

Fireball's anger was palpable. Fawkes flew and raced Streaks; he never noticed the sun fall apart and get a bit dimmer.

"Who disrupts the phoenix council?" came a voice next to Fawkes.

"Show him," Streaks said. So Fawkes showed the male his memories.

"Council convene!"

Fawkes was puzzled; there were so few phoenixes left on Earth that they hadn't had a council in untold ages. "That was my grandfather,  
Thunderhead," Streaks explained. "I think things will soon be happening."

Hedwig thought maybe it was a cloud that went in front of the sun, but not being able to see it didn't bother her. She gave the mental version of a shrug; this was a strange world, or maybe even a massive Room of Requirements.

"I bring you the memories of fledgling Fawkes," Thunderhead declared to the gathering of phoenixes. An array of images too fast for a human mind to process shot around the birds. "The bastard!" was the nicest thing anyone said about Dumbledore.

"This Fawkes will bond with Harry Potter, if he can be helped."

Fawkes offered a small, timid "Yes, I will bond with him; in a way, I already have. He is brave, loyal, true to people who he has no reason to be true to. Never think he is gullible, nor that he forgets or forgives easily. His magic, when I felt it, was so pure it was like looking into a mirror." He sighed. "I think that when he takes an animagus form, he shall be a phoenix."

A phoenix came before Fawkes. "Has he truly that much power and goodness in him?" Fawkes gave a small flick of his head and showed them memories pertaining to Harry. When they saw the small amount of black on his Auror, they were worried.

"I do not think the black spot is him," Fawkes said. "It seems to come from his scar and it ebbs and flows."

Several ideas were batted about suddenly. Maybe Riddle has used Harry as a soul anchor, or maybe he had used him like a Horcrux. There was even a possibility that Riddle had made a bonding with Harry like a familiar,  
and if that was the case, then Riddle was in for a world of pain if he was still alive.

After what would have been three days to a human but was only ten minutes to a phoenix, they came to an agreement: If Harry was a phoenix animagus, then the phoenix clans would follow him into battle. If,  
however, he was some other animal, then if Fawkes wanted back up, his family would come to his aid; five phoenixes were a bit hard to fight,  
especially if one was pissed off and protecting his bonded.

The Jokers were in conclave as well; after much arguing, they decided to stay out of it, even if the elves went in.

Narcissa sat back and ran her tongue around the penis in front of her.  
She was no longer snobby or even close to being proud; she had lost it all. The banks and people Draco and Lucius had annoyed had everything;  
even missing Harry bloody Potter owned the mansion now. Sirius kicking her and Bellatrix from the family meant she had no protection. Within 24 hours of her excommunication, she had been rushed to St Mungo's with he face slashed by a cutting curse and one of her breasts severed by another. Her back had been scarred by Lucius and she hadn't been to a beauty parlour in months.

She was working in an illegal whore house to make enough to feed herself and pay her rent. She had refused to sell drugs to her customers and only worked in a glory hole, so her customers couldn't see her and she couldn't see them. All in all, she thought it better that way, mainly as she still had people out to kill her for the various things her bloody crazy sister Bella had done, or her bloody limp-wristed husband or son.  
The member in front of her stiffened after a couple of minutes of her ministrations and a male voiced asked if she had any extras; he was willing to pay.

The voice charm on her made her sound like a male's fantasy sex vixen.  
"Sorry, no, I don't. I just give head."

The male voice tried again: "It's OK, we could meet after work if you want so they don't take a cut."

"No, I do not do anything else," she repeated. "I can't; I have so little left, I cannot and will not lose it." She shook her head and as he was in her mouth, he enjoyed it a bit. "Look," she said, sliding off of him. "Maybe one of the other women will, but I won't. I am usually in this or booth number five, so if you want a blow job, go to them. If you want something else, go to another number."

The man grunted, then a red light flashed. "Shit! Aurors!" could be heard from all over. Narcissa collapsed and started to cry; the screen had come down and the undercover Auror assigned to her booth looked down at the top of her sobbing head. "You're nicked, but I will tell them you only suck and nothing else," he offered. "It will help a little."

Narcissa looked up and straight into the eyes of— "Lupin! What the fuck are you doing here?" She lost all composure as Remus Lupin's partner and girlfriend came over to see what the noise was.

"Hum, hi, Aunty Malfoy! Guess you met my fiancé, special agent Lupin"  
Tonks said cheerfully. "Lupin, love, please let me introduce my aunt"  
Tonks looked down at the broken woman. "Wait till Mommy and Sirius hear about this."

It was too much. Narcissa took a knife from her bag and the world went black.

"Silly bitch," Tonks said ruefully. "She thinks she could get a drop on us with a knife." Narcissa's body started to convulse. "Shit, it's poisoned. Medic!"

A hasty stasis spell, and Narcissa was frozen in time. A medic came over and ran a wand over the knife; he looked at them and shook his head.  
"You would be dead if she got this into you," he said. "It's doubtful she'll survive."

Tonks shook her head. "Well, maybe it wasn't so daft going for the knife then."

Remus nodded. "How long can you keep her in stasis?"

The medic shrugged. "Maybe a month? I'm not sure. She's malnourished and not in the best of health."

"What about if we gave her a bezoar?"

"Nope, no good. This needs something stronger and the cure would take two months to make. If you can't find a supply, it might be kinder to just slit her throat now."

Remus made a snap decision: "Keep her in stasis. We shall see what Sirius thinks." With that, he and Tonks left.

Albus Dumbledore was more than a little miffed. His supply of lemon drops laced with a mild truth serum had landed him with 15 days in Azkaban. After his release, he had been placed on probation at the school. The fact that no one had seen Fawkes for a long time caused bad rumours of him being a bit grey, if not completely dark, to be mumbled about. Bloody Potter was nowhere to be found, and Matilda Baghurst had gone missing. Soon school would start again, and now they were trying to get him to host a Tri-Wizard tournament. Oh, if Potter was about, he would jump at the chance for the twit to get some proper training, but as he wasn't, Albus didn't want to risk any students, or more importantly, the parents' good will.

He stepped into his office. "Professor McGonagall, what a pleasure."

"Can it, Albus. We have a problem."

"Look, I just got out of Azkaban!" Albus snapped suddenly. "And you won't even let me sit down before you bloody start! Well, if it's about Potter, fuck the bastard! I want a bath and a proper fucking meal!"

To say McGonagall was not happy would be like saying the sun was a little warm. "OK then, I will leave you." Off she went. "Wanker," she muttered to herself. "Wait till sorting day, then he will know." She went off to see if Filius was still up. She sniggered; well, he should be. That muggle Viagra was bloody good stuff.

They all sat on or around Harry. "OK, here we go. Remember, Fawkes, no matter how bad things are, we need you to think happy when we get out."

They entered Harry's eleventh birthday and saw the letter: Harry Potter,  
Four Privet Drive, Cupboard Under the Stairs. The anger was palpable as they watched him meet Draco and befriend the Weasleys. The surge of joy as he made his first friend. The honour and courage as he went to save Hermione Granger. His longing in the Mirror of Erised. His courage and fortitude when he faced changes alongside his two friends, the pride he felt as they overcame each obstacle. The fact, even though he could claim vengeance against Riddle and Quirrell, all he cared about were his friends and making sure the thing in front of him never hurt them.

They left his memories, and Fawkes gave out memories of the Marauders and some of the pranks they played; soon, they were all laughing. When Jester was well enough, he spoke. "The level of betrayal is truly great;  
how can someone be called the leader of the light and a great wizard when he sits within ten feet of that monster? Its very aura made me ill."

"My keeper knew," Fawkes said. "He kept telling himself it was a test and would make Potter stronger. Also, he wanted the Stone; he still has it locked away—as you can see from Harry's memories, it was never broken." Fawkes shook his head and Hedwig glided back to Harry's shoulder.

Rita, Rebecca, and Alan watched the memories continue to play and Rita gasped as it finally seemed to sink in. "The first test was Hagrid's! He is still concerned his first friend and savior. He dragged him from the Dursleys, and brought him his fist birthday cake and present. It's so odd that Harry would find out about Fluffy; the Devil's Snare, I mean,  
you fall into a hole and the first thing you do is produce light, so how much of a change is that? Some powerful Illumines and the thing would have retreated. The bloody fact that it was covered in Herbology means it was a set-up; why tell anyone any tiny clue? Ron is a chess prodigy and has beaten nearly everyone he played, so a bloody chess board, well,  
how hard's that? The riddle with the potions—wow, can you say 'Hermione'? Smartest witch around. A bloody flying key, to the youngest Hogwarts Seeker in 100 years, oh, how much of a change is that? And then if that's not enough, Dumbledore uses the Mirror after Harry has built up a resistance to it and been told how to counter it.

"Plus, why the hell was Harry allowed to play Quidditch? First, he might as well be muggle born; second, he knew none of the rules; third, he is small for his age and the school medical must have shown he was malnourished, unless the nurse is incompetent. Fourth, he had never flown a broom and on his first lesson he got dragged into Quidditch where the Seeker is the main target. Almost as if they were setting him up for, say, trapping some flying key. Giving him an invisibility cloak,  
right, as if any 11-year old wouldn't misuse that."

Rebecca looked over at her. "It's going to be hard on him when he finds the Weasleys are traitors to him, only in it for the cash."

Rita shook her head. "It's worse than that; you saw when he had to go back to the Dursleys and how they treated him. Plus, they were told that he wasn't allowed to use magic out of school; if they hadn't been, he could have protected himself. That's not the worst, though; a corrupt Minister and Dumbledore were working against him. He is Lord Potter,  
last of the Potter line; by law, he is allowed to use magic to protect himself, and as Lord Potter, he should have had access to all his money,  
not just a trust fund. And I never saw him get any bank statements, so for the first 11 years of his life, where have his bank statements gone?  
And why was he never told when he went to Gringotts that he was classed as an adult?"

They went to bed all thinking on the things that had been revealed.  
Hedwig looked at Fawkes.

"He is mine."

Fawkes looked at her. "Maybe. Let us sleep."

The next day, the pair took off for their normal flight, and Fawkes shared his memories with the other phoenixes while Hedwig and Streaks played "Catch the Tail Feather." Dobby and Rita spent the day muttering about old wankers who should have their beards coloured and left naked in the middle of Diagon Alley, or some other such public place. They were having a competition to see who could think of the best punishment for Albus the wanker Dumbledore.

A Harry Potter moment happened; Dobby was losing, so he said "OK, I raise it to seeing how hard a Crumple-Horned Snorlack has to hit him up the arse with its horn before its nose crumples."

Rita laughed. "You've been reading the Quibbler too much! They don't exist. Now wait, I need go to the toilet and then we shall continue."

Now, Dobby could have just gotten a book and shown her, but he decided to fetch the animal itself. If he had asked the headman (also known as the beast keeper, the games keeper, or Bob), he would have known not to take the one he did, as it was at bonding age. If Rita, Alan, or Rebecca had been in the room, it would have bonded with them, but as it was,  
Dobby popped back with the Crumple-Horned Snorlack as it woke up. She lifted her head and bang—there was Harry Potter. She bonded to him instantly; if she had been sitting down and looked up, she would have seen Dobby first and may have bonded to him instead. The headman/ beast keeper/ gamekeeper/ Bob appeared, following the Snorlack, and took in the scene of Dobby trying to hold one of his charges as it started to swell and pull away from Dobby.

"Best let her go, Lad, she has bonded to the human."

"But-but Dobby want show Miss Skeeter a Crumple-Horned Snorlack so she can see it's real and I won't lose the bet of how hard one needed to hit Dumbledore in arse before its nose crumpled!"

Rita chose that moment to walk in; she saw something that resembled a Shetland pony with a horn. It was at least two feet long including its tail; it was multi-hued and had a weird-looking nose. "A-a-a-a Crumple-Horned Snorlack, I presume," she stuttered. Dobby nodded.

"A bonded-to-Harry Potter Crumple-Horned Snorlack, to be precise."

Rita looked at the new elf. "I am Rita Skeeter," she said as she bowed.

"I am the headman/ beast keeper/ gamekeeper, also known as Bob."

Rita looked at him skeptically. "Bob?"

He shook his head. "B-O-B, Bringer Of Beasts," he explained. "I bring endangered beast from their homes to here, breed them, and keep them safe. I'm a bit like the Hagrid shown in yon boy's head. My name is 'Rolly,'" he said with a smile, "but most call me 'Bob'."

He looked at Dobby and the Crumple-Horned Snorlack. "Crumple-Horned Snorlacks bond for life," he said. "They are loyal, deadly fighters.  
It's not just their noses that are good for fighting; they have teeth,  
claws, and are incredibly fast. Oh, and it would depend on horn length as to how hard it needed to butt Dumbledore. This one, with her two-foot, three-inch horn, would need to hit him about 134.7 miles an hour to crumple her nose, so just over half her top running speed." He vanished, then reappeared in a second and gave them some food and a few books. "You'll be needing these, and so will he, when he's awake." He was gone again.

"You win, Dobby," Rita said. "Make sure he's nude when he's hit with that horn, though, and in a very public place."

Luna Lovegood sat bolt upright. "I am to be married."

Her father looked at her from his seat. "That's nice, Love, anyone I know?"

"Harry Potter shall be my husband." Luna made a face. "How strange. Oh well, that will be nice for him." Then she laid back down. Mr Lovegood looked at her and smiled.

"Well, she has changed her mind. She swore she would only marry the man who brought a Crumple-Horned Snorlack with him and embarrassed many important people." He shook his head. She was twelve years old and female; she was bound to change her mind. Harry was so often in the press, it was natural he would have come up.

"No, Daddy, I haven't changed my mind," Luna said in her unearthly voice. "Harry Potter is gone, but he is still somewhere, and he has bonded with a Crumple-Horned Snorlack. He is the man I shall marry."

Mr Lovegood nodded at her. "Good, Honey, you said he saw you as you. I'm glad it's a nice person you're going to marry."

The next Quibbler proudly proclaimed "Quibbler Part-Owner Luna Lovegood Says: When Harry Potter Comes Back, She Will Marry Him." The story went on to explain how Luna had learnt that Harry was bonded to a Crumple-Horned Snorlack and, as such, he was worth her attention. She promised to make him a very happy man when they got married. Also, he would have to wait till she was 17 to marry, not 16, as she saw a mass breeding of Snorlacks she wanted to watch would fall on the only day of that year she was happy to marry on.

It was rather sad and funny that no one paid it any attention. They really should have learnt. Harry and Luna were both, at times, classed as "strange," and the Ravenclaws who teased Luna should have known a lot better than to ignore her, as she had often said stuff that there was no way she should or could have known, but had been major embarrassments to them.

Sirius Black read it though, and as he was Harry's godfather and protector, he smiled. As a Marauder, he laughed, got an owl, and sat down to write a note.

Luna sat with her father trying to decide which pictures were best. She had gotten in touch with Colin Creevey and asked him to bring his collection of pictures of her future husband. After Daddy had seen them,  
he had hired Colin as main photographer to the Quibbler and when he was at school, he could send pictures in from there. They also had gotten permission, as long as they didn't leave Great Britain, to take him with them to photograph anything unusual. This was mainly because his parents loved him and wanted him to be happy, and because he was earning a wage and Mr Lovegood was teaching him money management. It may hove sounded odd, but as he and his daughter ran a newspaper and made a slight profit from it against competition like the Daily Profit, he had some room to get the agreement.

"Oooh, what a nice owl, and good news as well!" Mr Lovegood and Colin looked up at Luna's words.

"Colin, open the window, please." Colin had just opened the window and moved back a bit when a large eagle owl came through and landed in front of Luna.

"Here you go, good boy," she said as she gave the owl a bit of her ham sandwich and removed the letter attached to its leg. "Oooh, I am so happy!" She picked up a quill and started to write:

"Thank you for your blessing. Harry has always treated me with respect and kindness. I know that as the last of the Potter line, he can do as he wishes, even though it seems no one has told him of this. I think Dumbledore's head is infested with bugly Nargles, and that is why he is so jealous of Harry. He should wash his head in peach fondue and it would clear up; sadly, my husband-to-be and his Crumple-Horned Snorlack will make a larger impression on him.

"When the wedding date is sorted and that, I know we will be honoured for you to give him away. Isn't that stupid? I mean, he isn't a present.  
Though I suppose I will enjoy unwrapping him. Oh well, even though you will give him away, I don't mind loaning him back to you every so often.  
Oh, and please, I know he has had a hard life and will have hard things to do when he returns, but that should be soon. Don't worry; he will kill the bad guys, marry me, and make you and Remus proud.

"Anyway, yes, you and Remus and his wife Tonks should plan the parties and such. Thank you for your support." Signing her name, she put the letter in an envelope and attached it to the handsome owl's leg, giving it another bit of ham and smiling as it flew away. Colin had watched her write and seen some of her reply.

"Luna, don't you need to read the letter before writing a reply?"

She smiled her I-am-on-another-planet smile and handed him the letter.  
He opened it and read:

"Miss Luna Lovegood, I read the article in the Quibbler and know you are from a good family. Harry has, in fact, mentioned you. When Harry returns, if he wishes to pursue a romance with you, then please do so with my blessing. If you decide to throw a party, please let me and my friend Remus help with it. Yours sincerely, S Black." Colin set the letter down and Mr Lovegood smiled.

"See, Colin, never doubt my little Luna."

Colin nodded. "Harry's alive and will be home soon?" he asked. Luna shook her head.

"Harry doesn't have what you could call a real home yet, but he will have. Plus he is dead at the moment, but as soon as he comes back to life, he will finally live." She smiled at him. "Don't worry. Harry will come back strong and his true friends will benefit while his enemies may want several changes of underwear and to pay off all debts before they meet him."

Colin wondered, spare pants or not, if he was on that list. He had taken so many pictures of Harry without asking, and he had found out only after that it annoyed Harry. Harry saw his claim to fame as "I lived,  
Mum and Dad didn't," not "I lived and kicked He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named's butt in doing so."

"He is your friend, Colin, just ask first," Luna said in a dreamy voice.  
"I think I need to plant some more radishes; my earrings need to be fresh when he gets here." With that, she skipped out of the room.

It was two days before the stasis would have to be lifted. Remus had gotten a hold of the antidote to Narcissa's poison and it had been administered, but it wasn't pretty. Weird colours leaked from her pores,  
her hair fell out, she was covered in boils, and she passed a kidney stone the size of an egg. It all could have been a lot less painful, but Remus had thought about Tonks being cut and his mercy was thrown out the window.

Now, Narcissa sat opposite him, shaking, crying, and hiccupping;  
apparently, this would go on for only a few more minutes, and then she should be OK. When she did stop, she was about to speak when the door opened. Andromeda, Nymphadora, and Sirius came in and stood behind Remus.

"So you live, whore." Sirius's tone held nothing but contempt; she was no longer a Malfoy as he had dissolved her marriage, and no longer a Black as he had cast her from the family. As the Blacks were a male-dominated family, he could bring back Andromeda, as he overruled his deceased mother. She was now Narcissa no-name. So he addressed her by her job; that was how many families got their names.

"I want Veratiserum, and a quill and ink and parchment." She folded her hands and put her head down. Ten minutes later, she had the items she'd requested; she wrote on the parchment and passed it to Remus, along with quill and ink, then tilted her head back and opened her mouth.

Nymphadora Tonks put four drops of Veratiserum down her throat and they waited till her eyes glassed over. Remus looked at the parchment.

"Why did you try to pull a knife?" he asked.

"I want to die," Narcissa said in a monotonous voice. "I have no son, no husband, and no money. I am now the lowest of the low. Rather than go to prison, I decided to kill myself."

"Did you intend to harm Remus Lupin, or anyone else but yourself?"

"No. I just want to die."

Remus thought about how he had made her suffer. "We never learn," he thought. "All we do is make assumptions." He read the next question aloud: "Are you a Death Eater or a supporter of He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named, or have you ever been?"

"No, I am not and never have been."

"What did you do when Death Eaters and others like them were at your house?"

"Lucius and Draco used me as a practice dummy for curses. They used to make me strip and do anything anyone wanted while they improved their Imperious curses. They also liked to lend me to their friends as a sex toy or a target."

Sirius was white; he had the same thought as Remus: "My god, I kicked her out and treated her like everyone treats Harry. I am no better than them." It wasn't a pleasant revelation. As he had publicly kicked her out after stripping her of everything but the clothes on her back, he couldn't let her back into the family; he had cast her out in the old way. He spoke, his voice quivering.

"Whore, what do you want from us?"

She turned her head to look at him. "I want you to kill me."

It was one of the things they couldn't and wouldn't do. As they left,  
they warned the guards to put her on suicide watch and to make sure nothing happened to her. Well, Remus did; no Black could lift a finger to help her or even acknowledge that she was a person. After they left,  
to lighten the mood, Sirius showed them the Quibbler and the letter he had sent. Andromeda, Nymphadora, and Sirius laughed.

"Sirius," Remus said thoughtfully, "when I was teaching at Hogwarts, I found out that Luna appeared…daft in the head, but was remarkably clever, and I think she has a touch of the Sight. She said a dead man wasn't dead just before I checked the map and saw Pettigrew on it. It was the way she looked at the map; she knew what it was. In my haste, I forgot to wipe it as I went away from her, and she said 'Don't forget to manage the mischief.' She may be right; Harry's alive and will return. I wonder how he will take it when she shows him that note you sent him. He has defeated You-Know-Who three times, and a Basilisk."

Sirius stopped laughing. "Tell me you're joking."

Remus shook his head. "Nope, sorry."

Rita, Rebecca, and Alan sat down and watched. It had been two days since the Crumple-Horned Snorlack had bonded o Harry, and today she would, for the first time, be looking at Harry's memories. They had tried to take her away, but the Bob had told them she wouldn't leave till Harry named her. The Bob was there in case he had to tranqulise her.

"This is his second year at Hogwarts and his second meeting with evil"  
A moment later, Dobby smiled and started to bounce. "This is where Dobby meets Harry." They watched his miserable excuse for a family starve him and beat him, and then they saw him meet Dobby for the first time. Dobby was a bit upset as it showed all he did to try and save Harry's life,  
but when it got to him being given a sock, the joy Harry felt for Dobby being free was worth it. He had them run it back and show it again as he said it was one of the only happy memories they were likely to come across.

As time rolled on, they watched more depression and being controlled.  
They left at his thirteenth birthday. It took them some time for them to get happy again.

"Why?" It was a simple question, but no one had an answer.

"All that time to find that room, all the clues, like Hagrid's spiders,  
Dumbledore must have known the last attack and first attack both at the lady's toilets," Rita fumed. "I mean, how easy a clue is that? Plus, if they knew about the spiders and looked up their enemies, then cross-referenced it with snakes…. I mean, Slytherin was a parselmouth,  
Tommy was a parselmouth, and why the hell did he never get Hagrid's wand fixed and give him permission to learn magic? The poor guy thinks Dumbledore is great when in fact he only kept him on so he has another person under his control." Rita was not happy. "Dobby, I raise your Crumple-Horned Snorlack to an infestation of crabs, lice, and a kick to his bollocks, followed by a Crumple-Horned Snorlack flattening his nose."

Alan went over to sit beside the chamberlain as Bob checked on a distressed Crumple-Nosed Snorlack back at the pens. Rita, Dobby, and Rebecca sat nursing drinks.

"Hum…. How long can we stay here, and how long have we been here already?" Alan asked. "I seem to have lost track of time."

The chamberlain looked at Alan and burst out laughing. After a short while, he stopped. "Sorry, we should have explained it to you. Where we are is a different time-space. We are out of sync with your home. It's better than any charm or anything else. In your time, it would be somewhere in October, but even then it could be five years from when you left and we could still send you back to the day after you left, if we wanted. It would be harder, but we could."

Alan looked at Rita and Rebecca. "September the first, you think, or should we wait a few days into term?"

Rita looked back at him. "September the fifth, I think. Let them worry."

So it was agreed: They would go back September the 5th. The Jokers still refused to get involved and Jester was of the idea that he would help,  
even if the others didn't. With the knowledge that they had chosen a date and could go to it when they wanted, a weight seem to lift from their shoulders.

"Why didn't you tell them you could just slow or speed time up here"  
Dobby asked the chamberlain. "The whole place is like a time turner, as they call them."

The chamberlain smiled sagely. "Dobby, if that came out, then if an evil wizard managed to get control of Atlantis, they would just stay here,  
breed a huge army, and then go conquer the world. If one heard of time travel and came here, it would do him no good, as the time travel room is rigged to kill anyone who uses it." His smile changed to a smirk.  
"And do you think they could even begin to comprehend how old or what this place is!" They shared a sly grin; it was true, humans were so stupid and gullible.

Rita sat reading a book and deciding what to teach Harry in the way of shields. As a muggle, Alan was going to teach him basic muggle skills;  
Rebecca decided to teach him about people and improve his interpersonal skills. Bob, on his free days, would teach animal husbandry; the chamberlain was roped into teaching personnel management and property management. Jester said he might be able show Harry a couple of mind shields, and maybe a way to regain his energy in a hurry, but he couldn't promise anything due to their being different species.

A week had passed and Narcissa was still on suicide watch. There was no sign that she even registered most people's presences and she was losing weight fast. When she passed out, the guards searched her cell; she had not eaten anything. All her food was hidden in her mattress. They kept her sedated and decided to banish sustentative potions directly into her stomach, along with some food when her system could handle it.

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Thanks to beta Lanie McCoy 


	7. Chapter 7

I do not own anthing you know from the canon, the rest is mine ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Chapter Seven ----------------------------

Remus watched as Narcissa was fed.

"She wants to die so badly. You can't help her, and I can only give the minimal help." Tonks, or "Nymphette" to Remus (but only to him; another Auror had called her that once and woke up to find a shrinking charm on his underpants and a great deal of pain in the bollock department. For some reason, the other Aurors took this as a hint to keep on calling her Tonks) said. She sighed. "No sign of Harry yet, then."

Remus shook his head. "After all he went through, all the lies and trouble, now we can't find him to tell him he can have a home and he can live with Sirius." A tear fell down his cheek. "Did you know he cast a Patronus that scared away a load of Dementors just on the hope he and Sirius could be family?"

She did know; when Sirius was in his depressed, drunk state, it was one of his proudest memories. He would have been prouder if he knew how many Dementors there were, but from the memories, it seemed like ten was the best guess (though Hermione Granger swore it was 150).

Harry's disappearance hadn't been easy for Hermione; Ron had abandoned their friendship as Harry wasn't there, and she said no to doing his holiday homework. Then the rumours about her cheating had started. On top of that, her whole world had been crushed when the truth about Dumbledore, McGonagall, and the others came out. Her need to have someone good in control was overwhelming and her need to believe that those in control wanted what was best for her wasn't far behind. Her parents were distressed; she had gone from a shy girl to a girl with friends who even got into trouble right back to a shy girl.

"Honey, the Quibbler's here, and the Profit."

Hermione barely acknowledged her mum. She only had the Quibbler because Harry had gotten her a year's subscription. She had thought he had done it to wind her up, but then her mind clicked in: He was friends with Luna and also knew nothing of the real wizarding world, so he believed Luna and wanted Hermione to see the magic world with eyes instead of from a textbook. Plus, it gave them something to argue about, as he liked to show her that books didn't hold it all. She herself had said to him something along those lines in their first year, but she had been so busy with this, that, and trying to keep alive that she had retreated back into herself.

"My god, Hermione! There's a cover story about Harry and Luna in—"

"Wait! I'll be straight down!" Hermione shot out of her room,  
desperately in need of her one true friend. Anything that could help him or get him back, she would follow. She grabbed the Quibbler from her mum and started to read, her hands shaking.

"She says she's going to marry him," her mum, Jane, finished lamely.  
"Don't give up hope, Love, he will be OK; you told us yourself, and from what has come out in the papers, he's not easy to kill." Her mum went white at her own words. "I mean—"

"Don't worry, Mummy, you're right, he isn't. I think I shall write to Luna." She had just finished her sentence when an odd-looking bird came in with a letter on its leg. Her mum backed away from it.

"What's that, Love?"

Hermione stared at it, her mind running through known birds, and it came up blank. "I have no idea, Mum." She went to reach for the letter, but the bird gave her an evil eye and she backed away.

"Don't you normally give them something to eat?" her mum asked.

"Yes, but not till we receive the letter."

"Well, maybe this one is from abroad and is thirsty, and in need of a drink and some food. Maybe that's why you don't recognise it."

Hermione grinned; that could be it. She got a bowl of water and some tuna from the fridge and put it before the bird. Far away, Luna laughed;  
the spying eye and ear on her friend Hermes and the "Copy Notes" spell on the letter parchment meant Hermione was about to be pranked. Luna didn't prank Hermione for a bad reason; she did it to open her eyes to the world and to give her some hope.

"Dear Hermione" was already on the letter. Luna started to write as her friend had a drink. "Maybe I shouldn't call you 'Dear'," she thought.  
"Hum, OK, how about 'Harry's friend Hermione'." Nodding, she kept writing. "I would like to invite you to Harry's and my wedding. No, it's not for a couple of years, but as you love to analyse everything, I thought I should invite you now." Luna smiled her own little smile. "I know the only reason you have the Quibbler is that Harry bought you a subscription, mainly, I think, so you could open your mind. Isn't that a weird phrase, 'open you mind'? Wonder if it would be all grey and bumpy like most, or neat little rows of books in your head. Anyway, this bird is a Nerdy Nibbler—don't jump away, that was a joke. He's really is a Greek messenger bird called Hermes, named after the Greek messenger god." She knew Hermione would be frowning up to that point, but the Greek reference would make her smile.

"Oh, love the pajamas, by the way," she kept writing, "but should you wear so much green? You might be mistaken for a tree fairy and have Whirly-Haired Nibbles move onto you." Luna almost giggled; that should be fun for her to read. "As you see," she went on, "Harry and I will be married. He is dead at the moment, but I am hopeful that he be alive in a few day's time. He is unhurt for the most part. Oh, I am only marrying him as he will bring me a Crumple-Horned Snorlack and let me tease people with the fact that it's real. He won't do this because he is mean, but to show the Ravenclaws that even those with big heads don't know everything."

At her house, unaware she was being watched and listened to, Hermione passed the bird some fruit and got another baleful look. Luna carried on writing. "Oh Hermione, surely you should know a Greek messenger bird doesn't eat fish or fruit, so why you try them, I don't know. You should know that when they come to colder places, they like chilies and other hot, spicy food. Also, your hair needs sorting again; it look like bad morning hair. Oh, it is morning, maybe that's why you're in pyjamas the color of Harry Potter's green eyes. Oh well, anyway, hope you come to the wedding." She signed it and scribbled a postscript as Hermione's dad Dan came in to put last night's chili con carnie onto the table so he could get to his cold grapefruit. Luna smiled; now to add that little extra.

"See Hermione? Your dad knew what to feed him. Oh, and I think Harry will be late to school, but I am not sure. Bye bye!" She watched as her friend ate the chili con carne, Hermione and her family watching it belch out a small flame and lift its leg. Hermione took the letter and the strange bird took off so fast that they all had to cover their faces as the downdraft sprayed Rice Krispies over them.

Hermione opened the letter and her eyes widened, followed by her mouth.  
She passed the note to her mum and picked up the Quibbler.

"How does she know what you're wearing? And how does she know Dan gave the bird chili?"

"Hum…." Hermione was reading about Harry again.

"Hermione, how does she know any of this?"

Hermione blushed as her dad said, "Harry Potter-green pyjamas, hum?  
Thinking of it, the one time I got a good look at him, yes, his eyes are the same colour as your PJs."

Hermione turned Weasley-red in a split second. "Hum, some think Luna's a bit strange," she said hurriedly. "She is sometimes picked on. Harry befriended her and listened to her. Sadly, she and I don't see eye to eye. Some say she has a bit of the Sight, or is able to see into the future, but all that is a load of—" Another majestic owl flew in through the open window and sat before her. She passed it some water and then offered it some tuna. The bird had a sip and ate the tuna, then handed its message over.

Inside the envelope was a small, neatly-written letter. Her mum read it out loud: "To Hermione Granger. I suppose you have seen the Quibbler today and Luna's claim that she will marry Harry. I don't want to get your hopes up, but when I was given the Marauder's Map, just before I came to get Wormtail, she spoke to me and told me a dead person wasn't dead. She looked right at the map. When I saw Pettigrew's name, I shot off; I don't know if you or Harry or Ron told her, but she called out not to forget to finish my mischief. A definite hint at how to reset the map. I believe Luna is a partial Seer; to see her column has given me hope. Please let it do the same to you. Your ex-teacher, Remus Lupin."

Hermione and her parents sat back down. "He might be coming back"  
Hermione whispered. "He might be coming back."

"Bloody great," her father said. "You look a mess, and the one boy you show interest in is getting married. What's he going think seeing you look like that?"

Hermione's head shot up and she looked down at herself as her mother cut in. "Yes, it's such a shame. I mean, he might notice you if you looked a bit respectable, but as you are, would he recognise you?"

Hermione groaned and shot out the door; moments later, a bath could be heard running. Her parents smiled to each other; the happy Hermione was back and she had a mission. Dan hugged and kissed his wife and left for work, his breakfast forgotten. Jane went to the phone and booked Hermione into the hairdresser's and beautician's. Even if this Luna girl married Harry, she would see Hermione give her a run for her money; she was 13 and Harry would only be 14 when they went back to school. It left plenty of time.

Snape was bored. Being a ghost was no fun; being a ghost trapped in an uninhabited bit of forest was worse. He had blamed Potter and Black at first, but as he had nothing to do, he had eventually sat down and looked back at his life. Now he blamed Dumbledore and the eagerness of a young man to bring fame and glory to himself.

A strange bird flew into the area and dropped a copy of the Quibbler in front of him. "Hum, a Greek messenger bird? I thought they were extinct." He saw the front page and spent the next few days learning how to read a paper as a ghost. He had been shocked at Luna saying she would marry Harry and wrote it off as one of her fantasies, but even if he didn't rate the Quibbler highly, it was something to read.

Dumbledore had read the Quibbler and wrote it off as nonsense; so had McGonagall, until Filius pointed out Luna's old test scores and the fact that she was probably a partial Seer. Luna would have been ahead of Hermione if she had always handed in her homework. Neither knew that other Ravenclaws stole her homework and often copied it.

"Minnie," Filius said, "I think we should go and chat with her. She might help if we show her our commitment." Minnie agreed.

Dumbledore was not happy; he had to hire Slughorn to teach Potions even though he detested the second-rate bloke and his little fan club. He also had to get a DADA teacher; the story of the Defense Against the Dark Arts post had been funny at first, but mainly due to bloody Potter,  
it was becoming a reality. Mad Eye Moody might be up for it, he thought.

They all sat around Harry's bed, ready with as many happy memories as possible. All the Jokers, bar Jester, were a long way off.

"Remember, Jester, you're our friend," Rebecca said. "Please, if it gets to be too much, pull out. We don't have to do the whole year at once; we can do it in stages."

They dove in. The Dursley scenes were unpleasant; the Ministry scenes were not good, but when they were on the train as he saw his first Dementor, they left. It was nearly two days before Jester was able to speak; they had called some more Jokers to come and helped Jester. The elves were in shock; they knew what Dementors were and where they had come, from but to see them on a children's' school train was far from acceptable.

Jokers were around Jester helping him; he was glad he hadn't tried to feed off of that bit of memory. It was worse than anything he had seen so far; the fact that he had seen Harry's nightmares was the only reason he had stood so long. The others were adamantly against helping the wizard or interfering, but Jester was equally adamant that he would.

It took a month before Jester was ready to continue. This time, more precautions were set up. They sat around the pale boy again and this time, they lasted a bit longer. They saw the odd Dementor in the distance, but it wasn't too bad; when they saw the ones at the Quidditch pitch, however, it was nearly as bad as the first one, but a Patronus charm seemed to hit Jester, or at least the silver mist of one did, and it helped him stand strong. Still, he pulled out before it ended. Jester asked Rita more of the Patronus, but she admitted that she wasn't able to cast one.

Another month passed and they sat around again; this time, Jester wasn't alone. The Jokers had been puzzling over the Patronus; they still wouldn't help, but they had a mystery to investigate. When they got to the bit where all the Dementors had come against Harry, the two Jokers had a hard time even staying conscious. Then, from the other side of the lake, a large silver stag shot out and attacked the Dementors. Jester jumped in its way and seemed to recover his strength; the other Joker was clipped by its horn and immediately felt a little better. As the memory played out, they kept getting hit as often as possible, just to last till the end of this battle.

It took them a month to recover fully, but the elves took as long to recover from that memory. No one seemed to be able to get happy afterwards, and the puzzle was how a dead James Potter had cast his Patronus, and why were people sure it had been Harry? This time, it only took two weeks to roam through the memories; it seemed the Patronus helped a lot. As they followed it from place to place, they eventually came out into a new memory and saw Harry use his Patronus on himself,  
and how he had worked it out.

They were all stunned, but for different reasons. Now they had caught up to where he had gone insane; they all looked at the child thoughtfully.

Jester spoke first. "How powerful a Patronus would he cast if he had real happy memories?"

"Wanker," said another Joker. "Dumbledore gave kids a Time Turner, then used them to break several laws."

"I think we should start to heal him soon," Dobby said.

It took them a week to set it all up with the Sorting Hat, Gryffindor's sword, Jester, and Dobby. Fawkes and Hedwig were ready the same day, but then they smiled to each other. "We are superior to them," they decided.

The day dawned and Ron wasn't happy. He and Ginny had nearly served their time in Azkaban and would be released for school. The guards made sure they knew the rules: No magic out of school grounds, and keep away from Harry Potter. Their mother had another six months left of her sentence. There had been a plus side; well, a plus as far as Ginny was concerned. The strange voice in her head was getting dimmer and dimmer all the time.

The male side of the Weasley family sat around the table in the Burrow.  
"So, Dad, you're going divorce Mum and disown Ron and Ginny, or what?"

Arthur shook his head. "I don't know," he said. "They did some true evil, but they are paying for it. We shall have to see when they come out." A tear slid down his cheek. "I want a family I can be proud of."

The twins chimed in: "Well, Daddykins, we have got the rights to a shop in Diagon Alley and with Percy's and Bill's help, we have a business account and everything. We are going to use one of our friends from school who has left and is in between work as a shop assistant while we at school. Then we're going to really concentrate on final exams; we need good grades and as Mum's not throwing our stuff away or pinching our money, we have plenty of time to really study."

Percy sat up straighter. "I am looking for NEWTs in Arithmancy,  
Herbology, and we'll see what Madam Pomfrey suggests as I want some basic medical skills. So that'll be Potions as well."

"We will have nearly the same for our OWLs," the twins said, "but we want Ancient Runes and Care of Magical Creatures."

Arthur smiled. The twins were never interested in school before now; he knew it was simpler to let them choose, and it also helped that Percy had come into it to help. His attention to the small details meant the shop would be possible and the first bits of profit were going to the shop itself rather than wages or anything. As Molly wasn't stealing his money, he had gone into a partnership with his sons and for the first time in a long time, he was happy.

The only sad part was Ginny, the first Weasley girl in generations. He had hoped Molly would be like Fabion in her way with money. She was definitely as protective of what she wanted as Gideon; shame she didn't have their honour and integrity.

Still, Harry slept on, but least they were getting closer to helping him. They all sat round him again; today, they were going to try and make contact with him. Luna, Neville, and Hermione had been invited up;  
they sat in a corner and started to breath in the incenses around.

"Harry, Harry, can you hear me?" Luna intoned. "Is Harry there?"

Hermione was annoyed; first that it had been proven that séances worked,  
and second, that Luna might be a Seer.

"This is bloody ridiculous!" Hermione snapped. "Fifteen minutes into it,  
the incense is giving me a headache."

Luna and Neville laughed. "Of course it is; we wanted to see how long it was before you snapped." They both fell about laughing. "Me and Luna used to do this with muggles every so often," Neville choked out. "It's so funny!" He curled up laughing again.

"Well how the hell do we get in touch with Harry, then?" Hermione asked.

Luna looked up from the floor. "No idea," she said. "He's still dead. I thought he'd be alive by now; oh well, school's tomorrow. Best get some rest." She promptly fell asleep.

"That bloody girl!" screamed a less-than-happy Hermione. She turned to face Neville. "So why?"

He explained how, because of Harry, he had gotten to know Luna, and she had helped him get a sense of humour; also, she had taught him a few cool spells. The two of them fell asleep on the floor near her soon after would.

Harry was in his cupboard when a voice he didn't know called him.  
"Harry! Harry, Love, time to come out!"

Then a second voice came: "I sorted you into Gryffindor at your request.  
Should I have put you in Slytherin?"

Then a metallic-sounding voice came, or was felt: "You drew me."

The first voice was joint by another female voice. "We are bonded;  
please come forth."

The next was the oddest voice he had ever heard. It seemed to be three voices at once, all saying the same thing: "Name me, name me."

Then a voice that seemed as old as time spoke. "Dobby is proud of Harry Potter. Now Harry Potter must come out and show the world why he is the greatest wizard ever."

Jester watched silently. They had managed to get into his nightmare loop and had watched it a few times; they had decided the best idea was to convince him that he was worthwhile and that he could leave the cupboard. They had been at it for three days without sleep, food, or drink, and finally, he seem to be listening.

"You drew me. Draw me again and smash this place."

"You are the greatest wizard ever; blow the door off."

"Name me, name me."

Harry decided the "name me" voice was annoying and seemed to be ethereal. "Name you? Luna Fulla," he mumbled. The Snorlack on the bed suddenly shivered and changed colour.

Bob smiled. "They got through to him," he said proudly. "Look, she is named."

"How long?" "What can we do?" All sorts of questions were flying about.  
Fawkes started to cry, and his tears fell into Harry's open mouth.

Inside Harry's head, the "Name me" voice changed to a single one. "You are mine, I am yours. We face danger and happiness together." In his cupboard, a light shone and seemed to get bigger; he could barely make out some shape, but he could see one thing clearly.

"Hedwig, Hedwig!" he called. "Oh, Hedwig, I missed you!" Tears fell down his face as his bonded owl sat on his shoulder and Fawkes sat on his other. "Fawkes! Does Professor Dumbledore know you're here?"

Fawkes looked piercingly down at him. "We are as one, young Harry, we are as one."

"Two," called Hedwig.

"Three," said the weird creature he now saw on his lap.

"What—who are you?"

The creature looked affronted at him. "You named me. I am a Crumple-Horned Snorlack."

"Luna Fulla…. The weird three voices, that was you?" He started to fuss Luna and Hedwig, and after a few minutes, a sparkle appeared, followed by more.

"I am called Jester," the sparkled seemed to say. "I am friends with Dobby, Hedwig, and Fawkes. You are asleep in a nightmare; we have to go to each bit and in each bit, you need to conquer it. Use the sword of Gryffindor and destroy this cupboard."

There was a swish and Harry felt the sword in his hand. In the room,  
they all stepped back as Harry swung the sword with the skill of a baby with a rattle. The door exploded and he stepped out of the cupboard; his aunt, uncle, and cousin were before him.

"Boy!" Vernon bellowed. "You will pay for that!"

Dobby stepped forward proudly. "Harry Potter is the world's greatest wizard!"

Vernon went purple. "Freaks, the lot of you!"

Dobby turned to Harry. "Fix it with your magic!" A swish of his hand and the door was fixed.

"You'll be expelled for that!" Petunia shrieked. "You'll be sent to jail!"

Harry smiled cockily. "So what's the difference between jail and here?  
Piss off, you tossers."

Everything swirled around him; he saw his mum die before him and he started to backpedal quickly. Fawkes 's song hit him and he felt a sudden anger. "You fucking wanker!" he screamed. "You stole my mum, my dad, and my life! I killed you as a baby, I killed you as an eleven-year old, I killed you when I was twelve! You'll fucking die and I'll piss on your grave!"

The sword of Gryffindor and a bolt of magic hit the memory of Voldemort,  
along with Hedwig's and Fawkes' talons. As he slumped over, Dobby ran forward and kicked the evil, dreaded Dark Lord in the balls.

"Tosser! You have never won, and never will! Harry Potter is the greatest wizard ever."

The world swirled again and he faced the Dementors. "You beat them before, Harry," Dobby said. "Do so again. Remember, you are free; your godfather is free; we are here. Think of holidays, friends, all the things you will have."

"EXPECTO PATRONUM!" The stag shot out of his wand, a solid silver creature, and charged the Dementors. Dobby seemed to like head-butting them in the groin area and vanishing while Hedwig and Fawkes just flew over and shat on them. For the first time in many months, Harry shut up and a smile came over his face as he fell asleep.

As they left his mind, they all but collapsed; water and food were brought to them at once and they slept for a full twenty-four hours.

Harry heard unknown voices from a distance as he slowly came round. His eyes felt like they were glued together, but he slowly pried them open.  
He looked around; everything was in clear detail. "I must have gone to sleep with my glasses on," he thought.

"Harry's awake, Harry's awake!"

He turned his head and saw Dobby there. "Dobby, where am I? What happened?"

Dobby passed him a drink and helped him sit up. It took awhile, but soon everything was explained. Rita showed him old Daily Profits and explained how his life had been ruined, and how Sirius had ultimately been cleared.

"I can live with Sirius?" He looked around hopefully.

"Harry," Rita said. "Love, you are classed as an adult; you can live wherever you want and the underage laws on magic don't apply to you."

For the next week, he slowly built his body up; the elves gave him potions and food, some of which no one had seen before, others for which the recipes had long been lost.

Rita was talking to Harry about animagus training, saying how helpful it was, even to the hated Pettigrew. "If you can become an animagus," she explained, "it will let you understand your magic better as it's inner magic, not wand magic, that does the transformations."

Harry took notes and nodded along as everything was explained to him. He was taught Occlumency, Legilimens, and meditation, as well, all to help with the training.

"So what animals can I become?"

Rita scrutinized him. "Well, to be honest, only a few become animagus and even fewer get more than one form. In fact, it's thought that Merlin had three forms; a dragon was the one he was famous for, and many think it is why his mark is a red welsh dragon. They say he was too embarrassed about the others. Some reckon one was a hedgehog. We may never know, so if you don't have one, it's OK. If you do, it's brilliant, and if you have more than one, well, all the better."

"So either I join the majority and don't be one, join the few and become one, or become a bigger freak and become many? Hum…." He smiled deviously. "Let's see if I can't become a bigger freak. As we all know,  
my luck is always all or nothing. Plus, I can register one form and not register the others. Let's do it!"

Rita looked pitifully at him. "I wish you wouldn't use the term 'freak'."

He smiled. "Rita, I have been called a freak all my life. When I entered the wizarding world, was I treated as a normal child or some show piece?" A frown crossed his face. "If I am going to be a hero, the saviour of wizarding kind—be a light for them—then I will be a freak,  
but unlike before, I will not be a controlled freak and I will not be alone." It made her sad, but she had to agree. Harry never had anything easy or normal.

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Thanks to beta Lanie McCoy 


	8. Chapter 8

I do not own anthing you know from the canon, the rest is mine -------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Chapter Eight -----------------------

Harry stirred. "Dobby?"

Dobby appeared by his bedside. It was early morning and most of the others were asleep.

"Dobby, I think I'm strong enough to go for a small walk. Can you show me some of this wonderful place your kind has built, please?"

Dobby was nodding and bouncing at the same time, his ears flapping.  
"Shush, Dobby, let's go." Harry swung his legs from the bed and put on his slippers. He held out his hand. "Dobby, let's go. "

Dobby hastily held out his hand and Harry's fingers closed around his.  
He felt so much joy that Harry Potter was holding his hand. As he led Harry out of the room, Harry looked down at him. "Dobby, thank you for everything. How I could cope without you is beyond me." A smile lit Harry's face. "And now you get to show me your wonderful city."

All the elves felt Dobby's happiness and even those asleep felt pride on a level they had only felt in Harry's dreams. "Dobby," Harry said after a little while, "I am still a bit unsteady, so can we go slow, please"  
This was a different Harry Potter from before; he knew he had limits and he knew he had friends, and for once he wasn't afraid to ask for help or admit weakness. It had been one of the hardest things he had to learn.  
It stemmed from the Dursleys' influence; if he complained with them, he was locked up, and if he wanted help, he was called useless.

Hermione had said he had a "saving people thing" when in fact he had a "too scared to ask for help" thing. If there was a problem, he always had to fix it himself. It was one of the things Dumbledore had played on, the "if not you then who" sort of thing, or "who else would you trust with this."

Dobby and Harry spent a pleasant morning wandering around. Every so often, Dobby would summon a chair and Harry would have a bit of a rest.  
By breakfast time, Harry was very tired.

"Well, Dobby, think it's time we head back? I could do with a snack and a wash." He was covered in sweat from the small amount of exercise he had done, and he trembled every so often; if they hadn't exercised him while he was crazed and unconscious, or whatever he had been classed as,  
it would have been worse. As it was, he had walked maybe a quarter of a mile; it had taken him hours to do, but he had done it, and that was all that mattered to him. Unlike before, he wasn't going to push himself too hard.

By the time they got back, the others were all awake. Alan looked up at their approach. "How'd it go, Champ? " He had started calling Harry "Champ" when he had first woken up; something to do with a rocky movie and beating the odds? Harry never watched TV, so he had no idea.

"You ready for breakfast?" Rebecca asked. Harry smiled at her and nodded.

"Shower or breakfast first?" Rita asked.

"Breakfast, I think," Harry said. "Then I want to do a small workout,  
maybe practice some magic, and then sleep for a few days." He laughed.  
Luna came over and jumped onto his lap as Fawkes and Hedwig sat on his shoulders. "Arrr, my favorite women!" He started to pet each one.

Rebecca and Rita frowned and said, almost as one, "He doesn't love us now!" and then ruined it by bursting out laughing. Afterwards, Harry had a breakfast full of laughter and good, healthy food, none of the Hogwarts fried stuff or the Dursleys' leftovers (if he was lucky) but fruit and cereal and milk. He still had to have some potions, but these were taken after the food.

Jester appeared and Harry lit up. "Jester, I think today I can make a Patronus for you. After all you have done for me, it's the least I can do."

Jester sparkled. "You know, Harry, how I feed. If your Patronus is what I think it is, then I may not be able to help myself. But even if I consume it, it will return the next time you cast one." ,.

Harry wasn't happy about this, as he felt his Patronus was a connection to his dad. "How about I cast one, then let it fade fairly fast, just so you get an idea, then I can cast one to last longer?" He looked nervous;  
he wasn't used to confrontation yet, and this came close to it.

Jester blinked, looking thoughtful. "Hum, Rita tells me some use Patronus as messengers and such. They do fight independently of the caster, so maybe they have some small intelligence."

Harry was shocked; he had only used his to fight. He hated being known as a fighter, though; to think he might be instilling that reputation in his Patronus gave him food for thought.

"Yes, I think that's a good idea," Jester said eventually. "Harry, cast one for about ten seconds and we shall see what happens if anything."

After his breakfast, Harry stood up. The chamberlain, Bob, Pheone (who had become good friends with the humans), Dobby (as if he would miss this opportunity to show how great Harry Potter was), and his bonded friends Hedwig, Fawkes, and Luna all moved to one side of the room.  
Harry rolled his shoulders a bit and nodded to Jester.

"Now remember the image of Alan and the Kraken." Alan shook his head;  
even after months, they hadn't let him forget it.

"Why me, why me," he mumbled. Harry's face lit up and he started to smile, then:

"EXPECTO PATRONOUM!"

Out shot Prongs. He reared up and Harry called, "This is to show you off, no fighting!" Jester was moving towards Prongs and seemed to be having an internal struggle. Then Prongs was gone and Jester seemed to glow brighter.

"Harry Potter, that was the most—!" Jester vanished. They all sat stunned.

"OK, what was the most what?" Rita asked. "Any ideas?" They all shrugged. "OK," she said. "Next lesson, I think." Harry started on shields like Protego, and some others. He practiced all day.

After dinner, Jester and five other Jokers turned up. "Harry, can you bring Prongs out to play? Please, only for maybe three seconds."

Harry looked up from the Potions text he was reading. "No, I can't. I've been thinking about this and I have an idea." They all looked at him strangely; this was not like the Harry in the memories. He would never have said no.

"What's the idea, then, Champ?" asked Alan.

"Well, Jester, what attracted you to my Patronus? The form of Prongs or the energy I cast?"

"The energy, of course. Wait, I see—if you do like when you failed to do the Patronus, you can release the energy and not endanger Prongs."

Harry smiled. "You got it. And I should be able to keep a steady stream up as the energy is spread thinner, so I should be able to shoot it out longer. Along with the fact that I like you and hate Dementors." They looked startled at Harry and he grinned again. "What, I'm not allowed to have an idea without Hermione here?"

"Well…you do say she is the brains of the trio," laughed Rita, and Rebecca piped in: "As she is the only female, it's to be expected, of course." Alan wisely kept quite.

"Shall we?" Harry stood. "Expecto Patronum!" A silver mist shot from his wand. If the Jokers had mouths, they would have been drooling. Harry smiled. "Well, Jester? Care to sample it?"

Jester and his friends shot forward into the mist. Twenty minutes later,  
the room was full of Jokers all glowing a bright gold. Harry stopped the flow of his Patronus stream. It took two days for the Jokers to come down from the Patronus high, as it had been called, and when they did,  
it was unanimous: The Jokers were going to help Harry. There was now triple the amount of Jokers present from before Harry cast his Patronus stream. It had given them enough energy to split three times each,  
something that had never happened before.

Two thirds of them immediately set off to find more Jokers; it seemed they were no longer a dying race. One of their countless experiments had come out well. They knew each experiment area would have a few Jokers around, but some were months away, others years. As an idea of distance,  
a Joker could go from Earth to the far side of the galaxy in a day. The elves and Harry and company didn't know any of this, as no species wants to be thought weak.

While the Jokers were sorting themselves out, Harry went to work on his animagus form.

"Harry," Rita said, "relax and imagine a forest. In that forest is an animal, or animals; you will feel a drag to one of them or more. Now I want you to imagine the animal, or animals, in a cage. The cage represents your body. When you break it, or them, free of the cage, your body will transform. So if you see multiple things, then put each one in a separate cage."

Harry started to sweat; he found the forest and soon heard sounds. He smiled in both his mind and in reality and mouthed "I am an animagus."

"Bloody hell!" shouted Alan as Harry shimmered and turned into an owl.

"Mine, mine, mine!" screamed Hedwig. "Follow me, follow me, Harry!"

So Harry did. Hedwig took him to the room with the strange sun that she loved to fly in. They flew together; Hedwig taught him gliding and how to ride a thermal, and his natural ability did the rest. But unfortunately, as Harry is Harry, he transformed into a male adult owl and Hedwig had the hots for him. *[Owls don't actually mate like mammals; they're birds, so it's a matter of males fertilizing the eggs the female lays.]* Their practice flight soon turned into a wild flirtatious tumble.

After some rest and a visit from Alan, Rita, and Rebecca, they flew back to Harry's room, where he shimmered and became human. If an owl could look smug, Hedwig did; she told all that he was hers and as he now had an owl form, Harry understood her. It was like a missing part of him was found.

"Well Harry, looks like you're an owl and you got a girlfriend"  
remarked Alan. He was amazed when Harry blushed and Hedwig looked prouder.

"See? He knows he's mine," she proclaimed with a smirk.

Rita looked at Harry. "Harry, why are you blushing?"

He stared uncomfortably at the table. "Well…you know how me and Hedwig are bonded? It seem that as I took her form as an animagus, it makes us more bonded than normal."

Alan fell off his chair. "You lost your virginity to an owl!"

Harry went to a shade of red no one had a name for and shrugged. "Kind of." Dobby and Fawkes looked sad. Then Harry said, "Can I try my other forms now?" As the adults were still in shock, they just nodded, not really hearing what he said.

Harry closed his eyes and shot straight to the cages; a quick game of "Eeny Meeny Miny Mo," and he set free his next form. Everyone was nearly blinded as a huge flash of light seemed to come from nowhere; a second later, another phoenix was in the room. At first they thought it was one of Fawkes' or Hedwig's friends, but then they saw the green eyes that no natural phoenix had.

"Now he's mine!" shouted Fawkes.

"No," said Harry. "Both."

Harry looked at Fawkes and suddenly saw things like how to fly and how to flame-travel. "The flying room, Fawkes, race you!" and they were gone.

"Dobby, what's going on?" Rebecca asked.

"Well, it's like this: Hedwig and Fawkes have both claimed Harry as theirs, and both mate for life, so it seems Harry, the greatest wizard ever, has two partners and neither are human. But I don't think he will try to mate with Fawkes yet, they don't mate till second burning."

The adults breathed a sigh of relief till Hedwig hooted and Dobby paled.

"It seems his fight with the Basilisk is classed as 'coming of age' and his death of mind, or when he was stuck inside himself, counts as well.  
Hedwig says they are in a mating flight now." Hedwig hooted and crooked her head to one side. Dobby nodded at her. "She also says…she says the post owls might join us. She isn't an important owl as such, but she is a double-bonded owl and Harry Potter's bonded to boot, as such, as such."

Alan looked gobsmacked. "'As such' what?" Rita asked.

"The evil ones killed many owls last time they were in power," Dobby said. "They also made it impossible for owls to do their jobs and many were mistreated. If she can manage it, all owls will join."

Three simultaneous "Oh" made Dobby look around at the humans. "Don't you understand? Owls go everywhere, they can get through most charms, they are all over. They see all, they hear a lot, and—and—"

Alan appeared to suddenly realise a point. "They are the greatest spies we could ask for."

Hedwig smirked as best an owl could.

"Where have you been?" Rita asked. "You and Fawkes have been gone six hours!"

Harry smiled at the memories. "The phoenixes will join us; they will be healers and, if needed, fighters. I have spoken to the Council of the Phoenix."

The other humans were stunned. "Council of the Phoenix, what's that"  
Alan asked.

Harry smiled sagely. "As Fawkes and I are bonded—"

"Mine, mine," shouted Fawkes in his head.

"Ours, ours, ours," Hedwig hollered back.

"I got to speak to all the phoenixes in Atlantis," Harry went on, "and as Dumbledore did an unmentionable sin against Fawkes, they agree to help me."

"Unmentionable sin?" Alan asked. "You practically just had sex with an owl and a phoenix in a few hours! What could he have done that makes it unmentionable?"

Rebecca hit Alan around the head. "The spell he used on Fawkes, and if he could tell you, it wouldn't be unmentionable, you moron."

Alan rubbed the back of his head. "Ow. OK, good point."

Harry yawned. "I think I'll try tomorrow; I need some food and some sleep." Dobby clicked his fingers and some sandwiches and Harry's potions appeared.

"Thanks Dobby, you're the best, mate."

Harry was soon asleep. Rita looked at Rebecca, and Alan and pulled them into her room.

"You do know he has two forms," Rita said, "so that's rare, but one is a magical form. That's even rarer; the fact that it's a phoenix is rarer still. It means he is the icon of goodness. Even if he is fourteen and kind of lost his virginity to a owl and slept with a phoenix a few hours later. No phoenix will go evil, and they have a huge amount of power."

Alan cocked his head thoughtfully. "So if he registers as a phoenix animagus, then they would have to believe him and not Dumbledore."

"It won't work like that," Rita said, shaking her head. "They would try something or other."

They all went to bed to sleep on it. Harry slept all the next day and most of the day after; Pheone said he was magically exhausted, but as he had done the mating flight three times with Hedwig and twice with Fawkes, plus the amount of energy to do the initial transformations, it was no wonder.

Harry woke two days later.

"Morning, lover boy."

He opened his eyes and found himself looking straight into Hedwig's eyes. "Morning, beautiful."

"Morning, morning, morning!"

Harry smiled. "Morning, Luna."

"Firebird's gone for a flight, it's breakfast time, I want my breakfast,  
why are you sleeping so long?" It was a morning for rapid-fire questions, apparently.

"How long this time?" Harry asked wearily.

"Two, nearly three days you slept, I'm hungry, did I tell you I was hungry?" Luna shot off at him. "Well I am."

"I told you the others would feed you," Harry said.

"I'm yours, you feed me, or your mate feed me, others don't feed me."

Harry decided to get up.

He didn't bother with a shower; he just got dressed in a pair of shorts and went out to breakfast. The elves had his breakfast ready for him and his bonded, as they now called themselves. Alan laughed as Harry hand-fed Hedwig and Fawkes and Luna.

"You are so whipped, boy!"

"Ahem," Rebecca coughed unsubtly. "At least some people know how to treat a woman. And at least he isn't sleeping on the couch tonight." She turned to Harry. "So what's on for today, then, other than looking after your women? Like a gentleman," she finished, glaring daggers at her husband.

"Hum, I think I'll see the other animagus transformations today."

Rebecca just nodded. "Well, it /is/ Harry," she thought. "Wonder what's next? Maybe a dragon."

He closed his eyes and Hedwig, Fawkes, and Luna left him, sitting to one side. Dobby popped in.

"What's Harry Potter doing?" he stage-whispered.

Rebecca smiled. "He's changing into his next animagus form."

Dobby started to bounce on the balls of his feet. "Three forms? Harry Potter is the greatest wizard ever!"

Harry shimmered and seemed to shake, but he didn't seem to do much other than change colour; then his ears started to grow. The adults looked on in amazement. It couldn't happen, it wasn't possible.

Dobby stared, bug-eyed. "Chamberlain!" he hollered. "Pheone! Bob!  
Leader! It's happening!"

Harry seemed to shimmer brighter, as if he was losing control.

"Come on, Harry," Dobby said anxiously, "you're the greatest wizard ever! Come on, my friend!"

Harry seem to smile. "Friend," he seemed to say, barely audible. Harry started to shrink and his eyes grew to the size of saucers.

"No fucking way!" Alan cried. "No way!" He was quite adamant that Harry Potter hadn't done exactly what he had done, but sadly—or maybe happily—he had.

"Hum, is this normal?" Alan asked after a moment, calming down slightly.  
"To be able to change into a species that can speak human languages and do magic, and be classed as intelligent? Not that other animals are not intelligent," he added quickly as Hedwig and Luna were giving him the evil eye. "OK, Rita, tell me how Harry just became an elf. Come on,  
you're the older witch here, so what the hell happened?"

All the elves, bar Harry, were dancing around. "We get our home back, we get our home back!" they cheered. "He is the child of prophecy, he is the chosen one!"

It took three days for them to calm down and stop partying. Harry spent this time swapping forms; sometimes he even skipped the human stage and went, for example, from owl to elf. He was having fun.

The old elves were over the moon.

It was true Dobby had been right: it was the time of prophecy. A human had evolved into an elf-level of morals and power. He was loyal to friends but would help enemies; he would take criticism and not lash out over it. Most of all, he had the required levels of power and integrity.  
The elves partied like never before and then, all elves world-wide bonded to Harry Potter on some level or other. Harry was unaware of this and carried on learning to pop and do finger clicking; good magic, as Alan joked, or wandless, as Rita called it.

Harry didn't know it, but a few wizards could do wandless magic; to most, it was simple things like maybe heating water in a teacup.  
Dumbledore and Riddle were two exceptions; they could do one or two offensive spells and some defensive ones without wands, but nothing on the level Harry was learning. He had most of his first, second, and third year spells perfected wandlessly and a few that wizards simply couldn't do.

When the elves finally calmed down, they explained why they had been partying.

"There is an old prophecy that states that when a human wizard becomes an elf wizard, then we shall be able to go home," said Pheone. Laughing and joking, they still danced.

The chamberlain brought forth an old elf on a hover-sort of chair.  
"Young Harry, we have much to teach you," the old elf said. "We will teach you transportation, speed," he smiled fondly, "and we shall teach you to have fun."

Alan looked at Harry. "OK, an elf, an owl, a phoenix, anything else you want to show us?"

"Well," Harry said slowly, "I have one, but I can't show you it. I need to read more first. And sadly I can't seem to find much about it here."

The old elf looked curious. "What form is it?"

He looked round nervously. "A Basilisk."

"What?"

"A Basilisk."

"Lad, you need to speak up," Alan said with a smirk. "Rita's a bit old;  
I can hear you fine, but I'm sure she can't." He ducked as Rita smacked him behind his head.

Harry took a breath. "A Basilisk," he repeated.

The old elf creased his brow. "A great protector, you can turn into a great protector?"

Harry looked at him shyly. "Um, isn't a Basilisk the opposite of a phoenix? Where a phoenix is good, a Basilisk is bad."

The old elf shook his head. "And why do you think that? You only have what you have been told and what you have read." He moved and a small table with some drinks on appeared; he waved Harry to sit near him.

"Basilisks are known as the great protectors," the old elf started in a teacher's tone. "Think about it: the Basilisk had a way out of Hogwarts,  
or at least into the corridors; it was massive and deadly, yet before Riddle showed up, the room and the Basilisk were only legends. Why did it never leave?"

"Umm…no idea, to be honest," Harry muttered.

"Maybe the Chamber of Secrets was originally known as the Secret Chamber," the old elf said. "Think on this: The wards around the place were done by Rowena Ravenclaw; the Forbidden Forest by Helga Hufflepuff;  
Godric Gryffindor was responsible for the moving stairs. What could, or what did Salazar Slytherin add for the school's protection? And remember, they did not have their falling out the moment the school opened, and even then, there might have been a reconciliation. After all, why keep his house if they hated him?"

Harry thought about it as he sipped on his drink. "OK, so a school is built in a time of war and anti-wizard and -witch times," he said. "So it needs to be secure from traitors and from muggles, so." He looked at the old elf. "I don't remember reading about any of that; why did you say they were made defenses? And who did them?"

The old elf smiled. "Remember, we live a lot longer than wizards."

Harry blinked. "What do you mean, a lot longer than wizards?"

Dobby spoke up: "How long does a wizard live for, on average?"

Harry considered it. "130 years, I would say."

"OK, so if an elf can have two or three masters or mistresses in a lifetime, then that means how long, on average, does an elf live for?"

"390 years? Bloody hell, some of the Hogwarts elves' grandparents knew the founders!"

The old elf smiled. "Remember, a house elf is worked to death. A Hogwarts elf has the school holidays to rest, so some are over 390 years old; some of the Hogwarts elves' parents knew the founders."

Harry stared at him. "What are Basilisks truly, then, sir?"

"Basilisks are used to protect things. People say that parseltongue is an evil language; why? Any tongue can tell lies or sentence someone to death. You will find that something is classed as 'evil' if only a privileged few can do it. Most things have been called evil at some point. A Basilisk lives a very long time; it's hard to kill and very loyal. So grave robbers and the such call them evil because they makes their jobs harder. Or, if one accidently kills someone with a stare, but even that is fake; a Basilisk's stare only kills when it wants it to.  
How else could parseltongues feed them when they're young, or how about people with permission to go where one is without dying? No, it has lots of eyelids; one is normal for when it closes its eyes, and one is a thinner membrane. What it has closed all the time when not hunting is the thinner, second membrane which stops the killing gaze. On an old Basilisk, it would be more like a stun gaze, as the membrane would have more trouble blocking its full gaze."

The old elf sat back and had a drink.

"The founders knew trouble would come to Hogwarts, so each provided protection wards. Rowena, to the inner grounds; Helga, to the Forbidden Forest and the lake; Godric, to the interior castle stairs and moving rooms. What about the children? Would the founders want them to be hurt?  
No. As it's a school, a secret room was needed to save them in, and something to protect them; Salazar and the Secret Chamber."

The old elf smiled. "I have an idea; come with me. I think you and your friends could do with some special training."

"Um—I'm not a wizard or anything," said Alan.

It took sixteen minutes for the old elf to stop laughing. "You do not need to be a wizard or witch to make potions! The ingredients are magic,  
not the person."

"Also, you can learn simple stuff like herbal medicines and animal husbandry." Dobby looked up at Alan and smiled.

Alan smiled shakily back. "I can help more than I thought? This is great."

Sirius and Remus were sitting at dinner when Tonks walked in with a bit of a smile on her face.

"He is alive," she said, "and maybe safer without the Dursleys and Dumbledore around. I've just come from seeing Luna; she reckons that he'll be at Hogwarts this year, and—" Tonks bit her lip and her eyes darted giddily. "Harry's not a virgin; he has the love of one female, at least."

They were in contact with Luna quite a bit; even though she couldn't tell them much, every so often she would smile and say he was happy or something. They had come to trust her a lot and were honestly happy for her as she was certain Harry's happy harem was a go.

It had come as a shock when Sirius had one day joked about how, as she was the bright Ravenclaw and Harry the charge-ahead Gryffindor, she would need patience on the wedding night. "No," Luna would reply, "he's with his first female true love. He will love me, but she is his first."

It didn't mollify them much, but when she later said "Ooh, he's going have a harem," and Sirius had come out with the triple-h "Harry's happy harem," Luna had smiled and said "We need to look at the marriage laws,  
as he's going to have a few wives and I'm not sure if some of his wives'  
children can claim inheritance." This had confused them, but then she had said it was because he would let her play with his Snorlack, so who knows?

Harry looked up at his friends and what amounted to his family. Hedwig was showing signs of fertility. Dobby was as happy as any once-enslaved elf could be, and Rita and her sister were at the nickname stage. Harry himself wasn't totally happy, however, as a thought struck him.

"Dobby," he said slowly, "you can go through the wards and can go from here to the wizarding world, can't you?"

Dobby looked up from *[*his wife,*] When did that happen? You're pulling a lot of really fast changes, but if this is going to be important later, it needs to be introduced when it happens so it's at least somewhat led up to. *who was clearly very happy with Dobby. "Yes, why?"

"Would you need special permission or talent to leave here?"

Dobby thought about it. "No, I don't think so, but I could be caught or summoned by Dumbledore."

Harry sat back and thought, then suddenly smiled. "Can a wizard summon a house elf that's not his?"

Dobby thought for awhile. "It's hard, but not impossible. It would depend on the situation; a Hogwarts elf, if known, can be summoned by a student to bring food or drink, but outside Hogwarts, that same elf couldn't be summoned by the same student."

"Is the name important? Can't someone, say, shout 'Elf, come here!'?"

Dobby shook his head. "Nope. A good house elf is conditioned to answer only to family and anyone that family said could use that elf."

Harry started to smile again. "Any chance you could teach me to travel and find people, and all the other things I need to leave here and go to wizarding world and find someone? I want to make sure, as a house elf,  
I'm not captured or called or anything else that could harm me, my friends, and my family, and I see all elves as my family."

This was hard; Dobby knew Harry wanted something and since it was because of Harry that he was free (and better still, married to Pheone,  
he wanted to help him. He also knew that if it made Harry sad but kept the elves free, he wouldn't give a damn about his own happiness and,  
truth be told, in this case, he was right not to. Whatever he had planned might be able to be carried out in a safer manner as a result.

A few minutes later, the chamberlain was called and soon, he had all the answers for them. It led to Harry having lessons in the elf ways, a totally different way from the wizard style; it also meant he got "elfonised" (a ritual in which he was given his elf name, a practice usually done with higher members of the elf community, such as the chamberlain). The Great Giver and Protector was his new title, although it was pronounced in elf so not many species could pronounce it even if they knew it.

Tonks stopped in the middle of her announcement; a strange house elf was standing in the kitchen behind Sirius, jumping up and down, his eyes wide. The elf smiled slowly.

"BOO!"

Sirius jumped up, kneeing the table and knocking his and Remus's drinks everywhere. It didn't do his heart many favours, either. It was funny to see Remus's expression, though, as he had tried to jump as well. The house elf was trying hard not to laugh.

When the adults restored order, Sirius looked down at the house elf critically. "What do you want?" he asked. He wasn't in a happy mood.

The elf looked sad and its ears drooped. It pointed to Tonks and shook its head.

"I think it wants me." Tonks looked confused, but the elf shook its head harder. "OK, it wants me out of the room?" The elf nodded. Tonks smiled.  
"So that's what he meant." She left the room humming.

Harry had finally gotten all the lessons that he needed and popped over to see Sirius. He didn't know what his disappearance would have done to his godfather, and he didn't know about Sirius being free, so when he popped up behind him and saw that he and Remus hadn't noticed him but some strange woman was in the room, he couldn't help himself and had to shout "Boo!" at the top of his lungs. He knew the results would keep the Jokers happy, along with the elves when he shared that memory. He had decided not to let the woman hear what he said. After all, they had both trusted Wormtail and look what that did to them. He decided to edit some of what he was going to say in case she was untrustworthy. She made it easier to do as she guessed what he wanted and left with no fuss.

"OK, she's gone now; what couldn't you say in front of her?" Sirius was looking at the house elf critically. It seemed reasonably dressed and had bright green eyes. Lupin had gone for answers first and even had his wand in his hand.

It was a shock; one second, the elf stood there, and the next, Sirius and the chair he was sitting on were pulled away from the table and spun round so he faced the house elf but also blocked Remus's line of fire.  
That was bad; if the elf was an enemy, they were in trouble, but then the elf suddenly launched itself at Sirius and said in a quite voice:  
"Padfoot."

Sirius was shocked. He knew Remus, with his werewolf hearing, had heard it as well, and he looked at the elf on his lap and arms wrapped round him.

"Mooney." The elf pointed to Remus. "Prongs." He looked sad for a moment and then hissed, "Wormtail," and spat on the floor. The two Marauders were stunned; Sirius looked at the elf and Remus moved around them and smiled.

"You came from Harry's, right?"

The elf smiled and nodded. Sirius and Remus sighed deeply and the elf pointed to them. "Proof."

Sirius thought for a moment, then smiled. "Well, I would give you some proof, but I haven't managed any mischief yet." The elf smiled hugely and its eyes danced.

"Proof," he repeated as he pointed to Remus.

"Umm…I taught Harry his Patronus," Remus said. The elf shook his head.

"Proof!"

"Hum…. I rushed in and tried to get Wormtail before Sirius killed him."

The elf shook his head and his huge green eyes glowed.

"Remus, I think it wants something no one but you and Harry would know"  
Sirius said, watching them both. The elf nodded.

"I am sorry," Remus said. "I want to hear what you have to say, but to be honest, I can't think of anything that others wouldn't know. As this is Harry's security we're discussing, I think I shall leave it; it's not worth it. Please tell Harry I said hello and wish him the best of luck."

Sirius was about to protest when Remus shook his head. "This is better.  
He lost his mother and father to Wormtail; he doesn't trust many people.  
In fact, I'm glad he's done it like this. It shows he is using his brain."

Harry had known that they were really Sirius and Remus, but he couldn't let them know he knew; not with the strange women about.

"I shall go see Tonks. You will tell Harry I said hello, won't you, even if you say I couldn't prove who I am."

Harry nodded and said, "Tell."

Remus left sadly. Sirius looked at the house elf wrapped around him and sighed. Once the door was closed, the elf started.

"Padfoot, my godfather, I have told this elf to be me; if he has, he should be on your lap with his arms wrapped round you so you can think it's me on your lap and we're talking. I could have given him a letter,  
but to be honest, I thought this was more personal and would mean more.  
Also, I told him to prank you first and gave a parameter for you to respond to with the security question. Now to the most important bit."

Sirius had tears in his eyes; Harry was right, a letter could say much,  
but to have a small figure in his arms talking in a voice very like Harry's meant a lot. A letter could be stolen easily or read many times,  
but this was personal. Sirius wrapped his arms around the house elf.

"Padfoot, you old reprobate. Yes, I have read a dictionary. Before you say anything, listen up:

"One, I am well and being cared for. Two, I am happy. Three, I will return sometime after this term starts at school. Four, do NOT trust Dumbledore, and watch his eyes; he will try to read your mind. Severus will as well. Five, get fit and get well; I need you. Don't mope, don't take chances, and see if you can get Remus to get you proper food and some Polyjuice, as then you can use odd people's hair and eat out once in awhile."

Sirius looked startled; he was a bloody dog, and all he needed was Polyjuice Potion to allow him to wander around free.

"Six, this is important," the elf continued. "Make me or someone you trust the acting head of the Black family till we have Wormtail hanging by his balls. Seven, dissolve your cousin's marriages to Malfoy and Lestrange; that makes Draco an illegitimate bastard. Eight, get the Black and Potter families consolidated as oath-driven to end the war.  
This means I can make Bella fight for us and have Narcissa tell us the Malfoy secrets. Nine, get any good Blacks back into the family, as I bet you were not the only one cast out.

"Ten, kill the bad guys, make love to the women, and spit on the enemies. The Potters are going to war and once you are cleared, I hope you will be by my side. I would love to have Remus there as well."

Sirius smiled and the house elf snuggled closer.

"Next, my friend, is some bad news." Harry went on to tell of Dumbledore's machinations and everything that had happened, some of which Sirius already knew and some of which he didn't.

"Now, Padfoot, this elf—and please do not use the derogatory term 'house elf'—this elf will bring your reply to me, but we have other things to talk about and I have questions about my parents."

Harry snuggled up to Sirius and smiled; he felt happy, but was confused as to why his godfather looked so healthy. He began his tale of the social worker coming to the Dursley's, then his time in the nut hospital under the name "Harry Dursley," and how an old person who knew one of his parents had helped him and was working him through the trauma of his life. He explained how he was eating healthy and getting lots of exercise so he would be fitter than ever before, and how his eyes had been cured by muggle corrective laser treatment but he was going to keep his glasses after he turned them into something useful, as it was an advantage in a fight if his enemy thought he was still blind. He was pissed the Dumbledore hadn't taken the time to make sure he knew repair spells and anti-summon spells.

He also told Sirius of the prophecy and his confusion regarding his lack of training, unless he was meant to kill Voldemort and then die himself.  
He told his godfather to wait, that the Marauders would ride again and make the Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse seem like tame bunnies.

"I am through being a punching bag and a weapon," Harry said firmly. "I shall live, breath, and be free; so shall my friends and family. Will you be by my side? I don't know. Will Remus? Again, I don't know."

Sirius was growing angry at Harry's apparent lack of faith, but Harry went on heedlessly.

"But I do know you two will do everything you bloody well can to make sure you're there. Oh, by the way, the army's war cry is 'Marauders rule, others drool.'

"Now onto the serious stuff." The elf shut up at once. Sirius smiled and made his patented Sirius joke; the elf rolled his eyes and continued.

"This is just further proof that you need a new Marauder so you can get some decent lines. I know the Marauders are an exclusive club, so first off, I do not want automatic membership due to family influence; I will not be the weakest link. I have an animagus form and sadly haven't had time to register it."

Sirius looked down the elf and smiled. "Isn't that a shame!" he laughed.

"OK, I haven't named myself as I don't know the naming procedure. I was working with 'Hoots' or 'Silentwing,' but I expect a Marauder name should be earned; others should choose the name for me. Think, Hedwig,  
if being on the run addled you too much, you can't get the 'Hoots'  
clue." Again the elf laughed.

"Yes, I know I'm being cheeky, but if Dumbledore is the only model I've got, then sod it. I would, after some checking by you, include the Weasley twins, but no other Weasley and I wouldn't even include them automatically. I was thinking of funding their experiments, but I need it looked into; maybe there's some way you could get Remus to have access to my money and pay him a wage to look into it for me. He lost his job at Hogwarts, but saved our lives by teaching me the Patronus charm; this isn't charity, this is work, and as you are hidden and better bloody stay that way till you're safe and cleared, he can be our mule and out-info man. He will need clothes and other things like ingredients for a Polyjuice Potion for you. I spent all my life after my parents died as a prisoner; I will not let it happen to you two. Your Marauders find a way; I will need information. The day before I return to Hogwarts, I will find you and we shall see what we can cook up."

The elf got up and started hitting himself, then clicked his fingers and food appeared on the table.

"Sorry, forgot in the rush to talk to you that you could be hungry, and so here, eat up. If I hadn't told the elf to do as I would do, then I could have corrected this, but I can't, so enjoy.

"Now, I need a prank to show I'm worthy of being a Marauder. I can't take credit for disappearing, as I was unconscious and then insane."

There was a knock at the door and Tonks stuck her head around. "Sirius,  
you got a visitor. It's Cissy, and she looks bad."

As the family could no longer accept her as Narcissa Black and she was having to be named after her job, everyone who could get away with it called her Cissy, her childhood nickname. It could be used as a whore's alias, as well. Sirius couldn't call her that, though; he had to call her "Whore" and after he had found out about the suicide and other stuff, it was hard to see who the comment hurt more: him or Cissy.

Harry looked on. What the fuck was that cow doing here? But then he thought, wait, it was Draco and Lucius who fucked him. He smiled and made a beckoning sign, then hid behind the door. Sirius nodded, puzzled.

"I know you are hiding and maybe someone send you food or something, so in case of this, the elf has orders to let you see your visitors. He'll zap the crap out them if they attack and hide or fetch help as needed."

Sirius smiled sadly. This was bad for Harry as it made a Harry moment happen; Karma wanted Narcissa punished and had helped set her up. She hadn't looked ahead enough, but at least this was an honest mistake.  
Narcissa no-name came in she looked like a one-Knut whore; her clothes were ruined, her hair a mess. She fell to her knees and Harry was totally mystified as to just what had happened while he was away.

"Sir," Narcissa said submissively, "please would you kindly allow this person to work for you somewhere? I would work for food if I have to."

Harry was gobsmacked. Sirius looked down on his cousin and remembered what Harry's elf had said.

"Do you swear to follow the house of Black? To never take the Dark Mark,  
support He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named, or betray anyone to him or any of his followers, by your magic and your life?"

Sirius's face was hard and Harry knew he was seeing the Lord Black of the Black family.

Whore nodded. "I do, but I have no wand; I had to sell it."

Harry, being in elf form, noticed that even if she was dressed like shit, she had a hell of an ass on her; unfortunately for him, he was spotted ogling her by the mischievous Sirius. In his mind, a plan took form; as far as he knew, it was Harry's elf sitting on his lap, and Harry had a plan to use Narcissa. He also hated Draco, so how good would it be if Harry's elf had its own servant? Say, a certain Narcissa no-name.

Sirius pulled out his wand and ran some tests on her; she had no Dark Mark or visible allegiance to the Dark Lord. He lent her his wand while Tonks and Remus covered her and she swore an oath to do as he said without question. Smiling, Sirius motioned Harry forward. Harry was confused; why was he being called out?

"You see," Sirius said to Narcissa, "this elf, it looks like it's taken quite a fancy to you. This is Harry Potter's elf, so I think I shall give you to the elf; that way, Harry has one extra helper, and I know he cares for people, so you should be set." He made some motions with his wand.

"I, Sirius Black, head of the most noble house of Black, marry this whore to the house elf in front of me where she will serve and service him for as long as they are married."

Narcissa blanched and Harry fainted.

When he come round, worried faces looked over him.

"Listen, Elf, it seems I going have a lot to tell Harry, so I wrote him a message. So have Remus and Tonks; we want you to take them to Harry only after you confirm they are safe, OK?"

The elf nodded and pointed to Narcissa, shaking his head.

The room cleared.

It was hard for Harry to continue as if he not know what had happened,  
but as this was supposed be recorded, he did.

He jumped on Sirius's knee and wrapped his arms around him, thinking to himself that he better have a bloody good letter.

"I assume all is well and I have started to speak again," said Harry,  
"as it is safe and you are uninjured. So here is my prank as membership.

"Get Remus to post a letter to the newspapers. This will give us a reason to annul Narcissa's and Bellatrix's marriages and draw them in.  
The letter should state that neither marriage contract has been fulfilled, as they were supposed to supply one offspring each to make sure the noble line of Black continued. They failed, and Bellatrix has produced no children. Then, when news that Draco and Narcissa are no longer Malfoys, hit them hard, saying that the Dark Mark makes most receivers of it sterile or impotent, as shown by the reduction in numbers of purebloods since Grindelwald's time."

Sirius burst out laughing; this was brilliant.

"Point out that the Weasleys, a Light family with no Dark Mark amongst them, are a large family, whereas the Crabbed, Gobles, Estranges, and Malfoys are Dark families and have no or one child, so are in fact destroying their lines by following Voldemort. Then show them that Voldemort, Head Boy Tom Marvolo Riddle, Slytherin 1944/45, is in fact direct descendent of Salazar Slytherin by his mother, Merope Gaunt, who was not powerful enough to attend Hogwarts. In fact, his father was a rich muggle from Little Hangleton, so he's not even as pure as me, who had two magic parents."

Tears were running down Sirius's neck as he laughed.

"Dumbledore knows this, and Hogwarts records support this. Oh, and rearrange the letters of his name as well—"I Am Lord Voldemort," this should be easy for you. I don't know if the Dark Mark makes you impotent, but imagine all the pure bloods training their sons like Draco. Would they risk their family line going extinct? It's the inbreeding making them sterile, but they don't need to know that.

"So I hope you find a way to do this prank for me in my absence; I image all pranks have to be refined so no one is caught or the group exposed.  
Please let me know if I make the cut; I will go now and return in about three hours with more food and some clothes."

With that, the elf jumped up and vanished with a soft pop.

He didn't go to Atlantis; he went to his parents' graves instead, and after checking everything and spotting a hell of a lot of wards and alarms, he didn't go to them. Instead, he sat outside the area and looked at the cleaned-up and smartened graves. He spent the time talking to them in his own head and hoping they could hear him.

When it was time, he got up and softly popped back to Sirius, who had his back to the wall; shame he didn't have a hat on, as the cold bucket of water might not have been upturned and soaked him. Harry laughed;  
Sirius looked wet and annoyed.

"Hope I got you again," Harry said. "We have a lot of time to make up for and you need help me refine my pranking. I told him that a bucket of cold water over a door was a classic, but what about a bucket over no door? After all, we are wizards. I sent him from you to my parents'  
graves, as I have never been told where they are or what state they're in. I have also told him to clean and make them look nice if he can. You will probably want to know, so I will shut up while you ask him."

Harry shut up as Sirius dried himself. He looked at the elf and suddenly got soaked again; the elf smiled and started to laugh.

"The funny thing is, once a muggle bucket of cold water empties over a victim, it's empty; shame, but since I'm a wizard and can refill it with magic, I only put in two loads. Just so you know. Hopefully you can think of something better than water for Severus and Dumbledore." The elf stopped laughing and stood still. "How are Harry's mother's and father's graves?"

Three minutes later, he was ready to kill Dumbledore, or whoever had done it. He had expected flowers and clean graves.

"I couldn't get close to look at the graves without triggering all the alarms on them; I also couldn't risk having the tracing charms get attached to me, so I was unable to do as Harry asked." The elf had real tears in his eyes. Harry had really wanted to speak aloud and lie between his parents graves. "I dare not speak aloud what Harry wanted me to say to the dead as there were recording spells and devices left all over, but I spoke in my mind and hope they heard Harry's wishes."

Sirius went white, beyond anger; his best friend and his friend's wife's graves had been violated, the privacy of the words friends had spoken to them each time they visited had been violated; Harry had never even been told were they were buried.

The elf opened and closed his mouth and then spoke again.

"I hope you have a message for me; I will not bring objects back, but will do a recording for you like he has for me. 'I may not be able see you till the day before I go back to Hogwarts—oh, and before I forget, I want all the course books I need for this year for all courses so I can decide what I want to do. I have two weeks into the school year to change and if you can help me with what my mother, father, and you took,  
as you all turned out so great, then they could be good for me too. Just look at the elf and say "copy me" then whatever you do, the elf will do.'"

Sirius was stumped; his letters were no good, but he knew now that it was a good idea not to send them.

"Copy me."

He held the elf in his arms and started to cry.

"Harry," he said, "I had no idea of the things at the cemetery. It'll be fixed. The House of Black, Potter, and Lupin are going to war. And—I sort of married your elf to Narcissa no-name, as I had her marriage annulled and kicked her from the family. I was really pissed with her for awhile, but she tried to commit suicide and after a bit of a mix-up where I made it worse, she became a hooker; after her hospital release,  
she had to serve some time in a nut ward and when she got out, she had problems keeping a job. She must been nearly suicidal again to risk coming to see me. I can't undo this family expulsion and I don't want to, but Remus and Tonks have been keeping an eye on her and as I can't help her directly because of a vow, and as house elves are seen as lowest of low, it's not classed as helping her. In fact, it would be classed as even more humiliation, but as I know with Dobby, you're good and kind, maybe you could make it a bit better for her.

"Oh, and Mooney is dating my cousin's child, Nymphadora Tonks. But don't call her Nymphadora, she hates it; call her Little Nympho, as she says she is since she met Remus, and in public just call her Nymp or Nypho.  
Hum, we shall see about the twins. Molly is wanted; Ginny and Ron have spent time inside for various things, and you should treat them like Dumbledore. When you went, the shit ht the fan and a lot came out.  
Severus is dead, I am free, Wormtail was caught but escaped from prison,  
Draco is in prison and has no name, Narcissa, as I said, is married to the elf you sent and is your and his personal servant.

"Now the serious stuff. We'll name you after we see your form, and I'm not old or senile or anything like that, cheeky git."

He noogied the elf. "We are looking forward to seeing you in flesh.  
Oops, I also promised you to Luna in marriage. I thought it was a joke,  
but then she turned out to be sort of psychic; she even said you would be here today and I would do something very stupid, but she also said Harry's Happy Harem would gain another member. Well, I suppose, in a way, it did, as you have Narcissa as a sort of slave. Next, we got you all the books and stuff you need, and we had Runes, Transfiguration,  
Potions, and Charms books, plus DADA, so."

He stopped and conjured a bucket of water that smelt of roses, pouring all over the elf. "Oops, I seem to have gotten you wet." He cast a drying charm on the elf and then got a hold of him again. "I had letters, but this is safer and more personal. The Weasley family are doing well; the twins borrowed money and started a joke mail order service, and it's doing well. Dumbledore seems to have lost his phoenix;  
no one's seen it in ages. He carried on for awhile about some personal stuff, some worldly stuff, then he stopped.

"Now the important stuff: Your idea with the sterile people is a worthy of Marauder level. It's pranking the whole wizarding world; even we never did that many. As you guessed, it would stop a lot of single children families from going totally Dark. After we see your form and after we name you, you will be a Marauder and, as you say, the Horsemen will have nothing on us. We think Tonks would be good too, as she is a Metamorph and can change shape to any human within reason. Be well,  
possible Marauder."

He stood up and smiled. "Well, that's about all; I think I'll go and make sure he's OK. And don't forget to send Mooney's loo!" A pail appeared and he smiled as the water hit the floor, missing him, but then he smelt it and looked down. The elf smiled.

"And Padfoot, my good friend, remember to watch your step; there are too many pieces of shit about with Dumbledore and Severus and the Death Munchers, so be careful not to step in any." With that, the elf popped away.

Remus finally stopped laughing, but Tonks hadn't.

"Tonks, it's not that funny. As head of the most noble house—"

That was it, setting Remus off again. Sirius walked off in a mood; the fact that he had Harry's elf drop scented water on him wasn't in the same league as dog muck underfoot (literally, as he liked to walk around barefoot).

Remus, on the other hand, found it funny, while Tonks might need oxygen if she couldn't stop laughing soon.

Harry popped back and sat down. He put the hat on so the humans could see what he was showing all the elves and the Jokers.

He showed them all of it. The anger from Sirius was felt, and the pranks he played made most of them laugh. Alan chortled when he saw Sirius look smug at not getting wet but horrified at his barefoot accident; though was a classic, he fell of the chair with laughter. With the few negative and mostly positive, it was the best memory that any had ever seen from Harry.

This wasn't good when it hit them. They looked at the elves and apologised in advance.

"House elves—correct me if I'm wrong, Rita, but they are seen as pests and bullied, oppressed, and typically treated like shit. Yet Harry's best memory comes when they all think he's a house elf. That is such crap I haven't got words for it."

Harry looked around. "No worries, guys, I was used to it. But now…." An evil grin flickered across his face. "No more Mister Punching Bag."

They all had feral grins then, and Dobby's, Fawkes's, and Hedwig's were the worst. That was to say, until Luna woke up. A fully grown Snorlack might only look like a kitten, but as soon as it was peeved, it grew pony-sized, unsheathed fangs and claws, and got a very bad temper. They had to let her into a room with plenty of things to smash and destroy for eight hours before she settled down. She looked at Harry and simply said: "Mine."

They all stared at her for a moment, then started to laugh. "OK, so how come you never told us Snorlacks could speak human tongue, Bob?" asked a smiling Alan. Then he saw Bob's face.

"They can't," Bob said unsteadily. "They use telepathy."

Harry grinned. "Hello. Welcome to Harry world, Bob, nothing's the same with me around." He burst out laughing. The other elves were worse, as some of them had, at some point, seen know-it-all Bob bossing others around; as with all specialists, he occasionally took the air of "I know better than you." To be dumbstruck in front of an audience was a specialist's worse nightmare. For an ancient specialist like Bob, it was worse.

"Remember when I first came here and saw Harry?" Luna asked. "I was young and immature. I bonded with him, but unlike a normal bond, I wasn't named, so I needed to know why I wasn't being named. When I was pulled in with the Joker, Dobby, Hedwig, and Fawkes, I saw everything,  
felt everything. So basically I was taught language, meaning, and pretty much everything else. As Harry said, this is Harry, so why would anything be normal for him?"

Luna's voice seemed to change into a sort of cross between an insane mother protecting her children and a badly-played organ. Whatever it was, it wasn't easy on the ears.

"There will be retribution."

Harry reached over and started to play with her ears, stroking one, then another till all six had been fussed. He stopped and saw everyone looking at Luna and him; six ears? She had two. Bob did not look happy.

"She is not in normal fight mode; she is in war mode. Her ears pick up sound from 360 degrees and she could locate a flea's heartbeat a mile away if she wanted to. She basically has hearing better than bat radar.  
Hum, that's the good news; bad news is that she has claimed her mate"  
He looked at Harry pityingly. "Nothing easy, right?"

"How territorial is she with her husband?" Harry asked with a wince.

"Well, she should allow no other to mate with him, but this is you,  
so…." With a shrug of his shoulders, Bob had to admit that he had no idea.

Luna purred. "Harry's memories and experience, remember. I think I'm the only Snorlack anywhere that's into group stuff, so his other wives have nothing to fear. Unless they make him unhappy."

Harry looked at Rita. "Does animagus training say how to become a particular animal, by any chance?"

Rita looked up. "Who are you?"

"Bugger, shall I take that as a no, then?"

Rita smiled. "Yes, that would be the best idea."

Luna's teeth came out and she looked at Harry. "I will bite you to mark you as mine; look for your next form."

They all looked at Harry, and Bob looked very nervous. "Hum, Snorlack mating is rough and not all that fast; they are one of the most stamina-driven sex fiends going. They just aren't big on families; as the parents love each other, they make very inattentive parents." He looked at Luna. "Let me guess: You love kids and would be happy to have Harry's."

Luna went sort of doe-eyed; unfortunately for her and her species, it looked like she was looking at dinner after a long fast, so had the completely opposite effect from what she wanted. "I will love our children and his wife's children. As it the right thing to do."

Bob smiled. "I hope you're right; if so, we can get other Snorlacks from you with the—"

He was on the floor with a soon-to-be mother over him. "Think carefully about how you phrase things, Bob."

He swallowed nervously; this was new. Normally he waited till the baby Snorlack was left alone and went and reared it himself.

"I meant you and your husband will produce young, and they should have care for children inside of them so Snorlacks will not be quite so rare and can go back to their home on Earth. I meant no disrespect; it's just hard to change my mind's way of thinking so fast." He gulped as long claws come out and Luna started to split his shirt open.

"BOO!"

He nearly leapt away and came close to fainting. Luna looked up smugly and stepped away from him.

"I like humour, it's funny." She curled up on Harry's lap, looking up and purring she said, "Well I know how to raise a laugh from you lot,  
but it's not a laugh my purring raising from Harry." She snuggled down as she felt Harry go flaming hot. Harry, for his part, shrugged his shoulder and looked at Dan.

"Is it worth trying to fight so many women, or should I just do as they say?"

Dan didn't think about it he spoke. "In my experience, women think they know best." He held his hands out. "And history seems to agree with them; do as your conscience tells you, but never underestimate the wisdom of a female."

Rita and Pheone smiled. "See, Becca, he can be trained," they said in unison before all three fell to the floor laughing.

Some time later, they had a plan: Harry would be bitten in a room with some medical supplies and plenty of Snorlack toys (trees and other things bad-tempered Snorlacks liked to destroy), and if he transformed,  
then he and Luna would let nature take its course. They were told that after the initial mating, they should have Harry change back as they couldn't go at it like real Snorlacks, no matter what, as it wasn't fair to the children and themselves. Out of Harry's memory, Luna had seen her namesake and said if they could, it would be nice to let the original Luna have one of their children as a familiar.

"After all, if she's good enough for you to be engaged to and name me after, then I'm sure she's good enough for one of our children," Luna said happily.

It was weird; no female ever thought he couldn't transform to their species, and no one seemed to realise that this was also part of the prophecy. Riddle had never known the power of a woman's love helping him.

It went much as they planned; Harry changed mates, made Luna a woman,  
and made sure of it a second and third time. The mating took five days to complete and when it was done, a worn but happy Luna and Harry left the room, sat at the table, and were soon eating fast and heavy. After a wash, they went to his bed; she curled up on top of him and went to sleep, Hedwig settled on one side of them and Fawkes on the other.  
"Ours," they agreed, and went to sleep with them.

Hermione was a new woman after her talks with Luna. Luna had professed that pure blood idiocy within breeding meant that most people could only handle one woman, making her hopeful; the Happy Harry Harem gave her more hope. To say she didn't mention all the discoveries to her parents would be a understatement; she had told herself that if they didn't ask,  
she couldn't lie, so she told them of the Quibbler stories while her mother helped her learn to cook and do other things a man might notice.

Her father, however, got in touch with Luna by saying how nice it was that she and Hermione were being nice to each other, even if they both wanted the same man. Luna's reply, "Oh, we're not competing; we're both going to marry him. Ask her about the old multi-wives laws and her membership in the Triple H Club (Harry's Happy Harem)" nearly had him fall from the chair he was on. The thing was, first of all, he had started to make himself nice (his wife reminded him of that), and second, he had encouraged his daughter to try and make Harry hers.  
Mainly to make her smile again, but still, he couldn't help thinking that it was his fault. Third, fathers were supposed to be pissed at the men in these situations, but as the man—Harry—had no idea what was going on, Dan was the man in the situation. He was buggered.

Alan would have shown Rebecca the letter straight away, but Dan wasn't Alan, so he hid it and the facts in it from his wife and decided to sort it out later when he was alone with his daughter. Sadly, by the time he realised he had screwed up, Hermione was off to stay at the Lovegoods and then head straight to school. And to make it worse, he had been so helpful when Mr Lovegood and Luna turned up and been introduced. When they were about to leave, Mr Lovegood had turned to him and his wife and said: "Best be going, the Portkey is about ready. I must say, it's nice to meet other open-minded people, what with your allowing Hermione into the Triple H Club. Bye now!"

Hermione had gone red, as she had no idea what Mr Lovegood meant, but his use of the word "allowed" meant her parents knew something. She had waved and called out that she loved them and would write soon. Luna waved and smiled and then they were gone.

After they were gone, Emma got the letter, read it, and looked at Dan with a sweet smile. Well, he woke up later and saw Emma looking down at him.

"You owe me a new rolling pin," she said. "I broke mine on your head, so it's your fault." He winced; she was still mad at him.

Hermione had asked Mr Lovegood what he had meant and he explained that Dan had been told about the Triple-H club and had continued encouraging her, which must have meant he and his wife agreed to it. Hermione sent her parents a letter saying she sorry she had not told them about the club and was glad they were so understanding. She signed it "Love you lots and thank you for making me so happy."

When he woke up again, Dan was confused and his eyes were glazed other slightly.

"You owe me another rolling pin."

"Wh-wh-what—" He couldn't speak right and he had a killer headache;  
lucky he knew where Hermione kept her headache potions. He took the letter from his wife and when he could finally read it, his face fell.  
"Bugger, she assumes we both knew and agreed."

Poor Dan slept from then till Hermione came home for a holiday. Neither wanted hurt Hermione, but Emma had to let him know she wasn't happy.

When Harry finally awoke, he got up after moving Luna from him and got ready for the day. He went into the main room and started to eat. Alan smiled mischievously.

"So, lover boy, we told you to mate once and then turn back, not god knows how many times in those five days."

Harry looked up from his drink. "Hum, how long I been asleep?"

Rita looked up. "Five days, it seems. Bob said that for each day of intimacy, you would sleep one day."

Harry blushed. "Oh."

Rita smiled. "And Luna's going be a mum."

Harry got a huge smile on his face. "So I'm a farther to owls,  
phoenixes, and now a Snorlack." He directed his grin at Rita. "No, no,  
no, I am not going to go bug and bite you, no." Harry rolled on the floor laughing. "Of course not, you're like an auntie or a mother to men as well as a teacher. I just wanted see your face! Oh, and Alan, we only did it three times. The first didn't last long, but it was so good, and the other two were slow and more loving." He sat up and shook his head.  
"And remember all we did for five days was sex; there was no sleeping at all, no eating, nothing." He turned to Rita. "And you turned me down?"

This got Alan red, along with Rita. Rebecca burst out laughing. "Bob"  
she called. "Harry was just telling us about Snorlacks and their sexual appetites; he said the first time was fast but the other two were slow and loving."

Bob turned to Harry and shook his head. "You had to have sex fast the first time to break her in and to stimulate her breeding cycle. The other two times were to get her pregnant, but you only had sex once,  
even if you came three times. The first stimulated her breeding cycle,  
the second took down the barriers on her eggs, and the third fertilised her eggs to make sure she was pregnant. So you only made love in the Snorlack way once. And I must say, I was surprised it only took five days; most take longer, but you are both young, so in the future you both might be a bit slower. But remember to feed up well as more than five days with no food, water, or sleep isn't good for a human, and you are an animagus, not a true Snorlack."

He looked up and smiled. "But I suppose five days of nonstop sex isn't too bad for a new Snorlack. I have checked on Luna and she and the young are well; she may sleep a bit longer, as she is now a mother."

With that, he left an even redder Rita, Alan, and Rebecca. "Well, seems like I did as you asked," Harry said. "That's good." He smiled and went back to eating.

"Five days nonstop, ouch." Both women and Alan crossed their legs.

A couple of days later, when Harry and his women were relaxed, they got back to Padfoot's message.

"I think I should go back and tell him OK, and see what else we can learn," Harry said. "I shall pretend after I give my message that the elf has a lot of freedom to do stuff like bring solid letters and such back, but I can't go just yet, as it's too close to when I left. Unless I go a few days after I left…. Hum…OK, I think two days after the last visit should do it. That should give us time to meet them and to start laying plans."

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Thanks to beta Lanie McCoy 


	9. Chapter 9

I do not own anthing you know from the canon, the rest is mine -----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Chapter Nine -----------------------

Alan, Rebecca, and Rita came in for breakfast and found the Sorting Hat and Harry chatting away. The hat was rarely about these days, or at least they, to their detriment, had partially forgotten about it. Harry looked up when they entered and smiled his "someone's going to get it"  
smile.

"We finished our little project," he said, "and the headmaster's in for a small shock."

Flashback

Harry was tired. Even with all the sleep he had gotten, talking inside his head had solved some of his problems, but talking aloud seemed to make the healing real. The others were asleep and he was grateful for the privacy to let his tears flow.

"That's good, let it out."

Harry looked up and saw the Sorting Hat watching him; he tried to stop the flow of tears.

"No, Harry, you need to cry."

Harry looked guilty. "I thought I was alone," he said. "I forgot about you, sorry." And he was; the hat, as much as any of the others—if not more so, in some ways, had helped him, and then sort of been discarded.

"I'm use to it," the hat said. "Dragged out once a year to say my piece,  
and back on top of the cupboard. I also sort of know how you feel." The hat took a breath. "When I was first made, I had the personalities of the four founders inside me, all of them competing for dominance. I had to chat to all of them and talk about issues inside my head before I could be of any use. Sometimes it seemed as though there was no hope. It was through all the talking that Salazar and Godric stopped their bickering; by helping me with my issues, they helped each other. In a way, it' how the Chamber came about. Rowena had made the wards, Helga the Forest and some stuff in the lake, and Godric was working on the armour. It was Salazar's comment about the children of the poor that started it."

Harry squinted at the hat. "What?"

"OK," the hat started. "Purebloods are just the rich and lordy types of old and in those days, station in life was everything. Salazar wanted the magic children of the serfs and other lower class citizens kept separate, as the wealthy ones kept hurting and pushing them around. But as it was a time of honour, I came about. I mean, if you pushed a serf about and lost points for your house, then you were dishonoring your house and for many years, it worked. There needed to be a way that children could be put with others like them, or in a place that would help them reach their full potential. As this would be needed after their deaths when they could no longer make the selections themselves, I came about. Most think I was Godric's hat, but I wasn't; I was a gift from Merlin himself, as he was a neutral party and the ambient magic in me would be neutral."

Harry sat back and digested this information.

"Hat, I remember a book I read once, and as I am part Marauder and have a sneaky brain, I have a plan. If you would care to join me, that is."

The hat sat and contemplated it. "OK," it said. "Let's hear it."

Harry smiled. "Well, you are classed as a member of staff at Hogwarts,  
correct?"

"Yes, but I don't—"

Harry held up his hand. "And you are, in fact, the four founders, in a way. Correct?"

"Yes…."

"So say I gave you a golem's body and put you on its head, and you were its chit or chet or chem or whatever it was called was, and then—"

He didn't get to carry on. "You should have been in Slytherin," the hat said. "I would be a walking, talking personification of the four founders, and as such, Hogwarts would be mine. Whoever was headmaster or mistress would be a figurehead at the best."

Harry laughed. "Shall we see how to make you, how shall we say…." He grinned. "Unfit to sit on a shelf?"

They would have done a pair of old hags proud with their cackling laughs.

Present Day

Alan, Rebecca, and Rita went over to Harry and the hat. "So what mischief are you up to, then? And who is going to get it?"

The hat looked shocked and so did Harry, but it was spoilt when they both broke down and started to laugh. The adults looked at each other and smiled. "Dumbledore."

That set Harry and the hat off again. "It's close to September the first, and Sirius never said anything about Hat here being missing."

"Bloody ungrateful git," mumbled the hat.

"So we have cooked up a little surprise for him." That was too much for Hat and it broke down laughing.

"Harry, isn't it time you went and saw Black and company? To see how many more women you've become engaged to or married while you were here," smirked Rita.

"Fine," Harry sighed dramatically, "spoil our fun. Just because we haven't told you." With that Harry stuck his tongue out. The hat burst out laughing; the adults looked at him and smiled.

"So, Hat, just what have you and Harry been cooking up?"

"BOO!"

They all jumped. "Just how stupid do you think I am? We can control when I go back and with the lessons from you and all the others, I may or may not have heard the term 'divide and conquer'."

They all looked sheepish, so Becca went for the puppy dog eyes in a plea for forgiveness. Rita just grinned and knelt before him. "Oh, high and mighty one," she simpered, "please tell this humble one what your plans are. Come on, Alan, this is a united front; we stand divided, we fall."

That was it; Harry and the hat broke down with laughter again. After some time, they managed to get themselves under control.

"So what's so funny, then?" Alan asked.

"Well," Harry said. "You know how the hat wanted to put me in Slytherin?  
I decided to bring my Slytherin side out a bit more. The hat is considered a member of the school's staff; as such, I have, in fact,  
been with a member of staff the whole time I've been gone. I have also been cooking up something—literally." He looked at the hat. "Shall we show them, or let them wait?"

The hat decided to be merciful and let Harry show them his golem body.  
Once he was in the head, he spoke in his normal voice, but it sounded more like a echo than a straight mouth-to-ear voice. Harry and the others worked out what to say to his godfather and then he transformed and left.

To Sirius, Harry's elf had been gone for a day, and when he heard a soft pop he looked up. The elf smiled at him.

"It seems as if you've been a touch busy," the elf said. "I am glad about Remus, I wish him all the best. With the elf, though, you have stuck me in an awkward position, as it means I'm married to her and not the elf—well, the elf as well, in a way." The elf grinned crookedly. "In fact, I think I might have to prank you to make up for it. Oh, be at Hogwarts five days into the term and pretend you heard nothing from me.

"Hum, I not happy with the Weasley females or Ron, but I am glad to hear about Arthur. Well, think that's all for now, other than to say I'm glad Moony got a girlfriend; the fact she loves the name Nympho means probably so does Moony." The elf widened his already lamp-like eyes innocently and noticed a flush on Tonks' and Mooney's faces. "Well,  
guess that paid off," he thought. "I thought he was trying prank me;  
looks like they're both going to have words with him before long." It was so hard to hide his grin, but he managed. "Oh yes, definitely words.  
Maybe something else as well."

"Well, that's all I can think of," the elf said. "Please keep the good work up, and please don't marry me off anymore. What with Luna, now Draco's mum—wait, I'm married to bloody Draco's mum? Oh, this just gets better. Godfather, you best hope there's a Godmother to patch you up when I get round to pranking you. Moony, I might need an assistant; hope you're up for it. Maybe we could include Mrs Moony, or is it still Miss Tonks? Or Nympho? I also have some news about your hairy problem, and I hope it makes up for all the hassle my dear Godfather put you through."

They all stared at the elf, then at Sirius. "So I am to be called Nympho, am I, Paddy my dear relative?"

Sirius gulped, and Remus jumped in. "And you married a slave to Harry?  
Oh, this just gets better. So Harry's Happy Harem is now Luna, the slave—I wonder if Miss Granger in it as well."

The elf's ears perked up. Hermione? What did she have to do with this?  
He didn't like Tonks' smirk.

"Oh, she is. She and Luna are already working out a rotation on days to be upgraded to nights as well, when they older."

Harry gulped. OK, so his love life wouldn't be boring; well, that was one thing, any way. It did bring up the question of whether he would survive it, though.

"See about multiple pets at Hogwarts," the elf said, "in a roundabout way, if you can. Say I sent Moony a note asking him to get all my books and that I was well and incommunicado. That should appease no one, but would cover you two, as I'm not supposed to know you're free or any of the other news. You might want go to Hogwarts every day till I arrive,  
as I said I would be there but won't be on the train or there when you get there. A daily visit would be expected."

The adults looked impressed at the elf; it seemed Harry had thought a lot of stuff through and this was prank-planning on a good size scale.  
"So," Sirius said, "is that all he has to say, then?"

The elf nodded.

"My name is Tonks," Tonks said. "It's all I will answer to, so please tell Harry that from me."

The elf nodded again and hid its smile. "Knew it was a prank, old timer,  
who would call themselves that? But I sent my elf friend and told him to wait till she was about before showing himself. You will have to do better than that; oh, have you got your slippers on today?"

Sirius looked down fast—so fast, he didn't see the big fancy cream cake till after his face had hit it. Remus and Tonks broke out laughing.

"Soon I hope to prank you all, then get on to pranking the rest of the world. OK, now you can tell me the news you have." Harry was only able to keep a straight face due to the mind protection skills he had learned from the Jokers.

"Well, it wasn't quite that bad, but close." Remus voiced aloud what they were all thinking. "He has pranked most of the wizarding world with his article in the paper, so I wonder who this is set up to prank." He looked at Sirius. "Well, Old Man, hope it's not you." And he started to laugh.

All of the sudden, the elf started to sing: "Sing a song of six pence, a pocket full of—" He stopped as Sirius gently started to feel into his pocket; he looked up from his clothes with a sigh of relief.

"For a moment, I thought he had pranked me again." The others laughed.

"Snape's hair oil," the elf continued; he looked at Remus.

Remus tried to look inconspicuous, but when he burst out "Ew, that's just plain wrong," Sirius and Tonks started to laugh. Remus pulled his hand out of his robe pocket; it was dripping with some sort of smelly,  
greasy-looking oil.

"Did you think I would only prank Padfoot?" the elf asked. "Oh, no, you and Tonks are both targets as well, but I swear on my nearly-Marauder honour that what happens at Hogwarts isn't a prank on you two."

Tonks went white but she smiled quickly. She had no pockets. "Ha, ha"  
she thought smugly. Starting to giggle, she looked at Remus, who was trying to get the oil off his hand.

"Um, Tonks, that isn't the end of—"

Sirius started to sneeze. So did Remus and Tonks.

"Achoo, achoo, you all fall down!" The elf looked at Sirius. "Sorry; if you left the room, you wouldn't have been caught in the sneeze spell.  
You must be getting old; you knew it wasn't the end of rhyme but remained instead of letting these two be pranked by themselves."

The little elf abruptly stopped jumping up and down and laughing.  
Narcissa had come into the room and seen her husband; her mind was a total blank, as it had been since her new marriage. The elf hadn't noticed her.

"I need a chair so I can go over some papers with you and to see what mess you got Harry into," he said. Narcissa came over to the elf and got on all fours behind him; he turned and saw her, nodded to himself, and jumped onto her back. "This will do; I think it's about the right height."

They sat and talked about his holdings and other things. He didn't know when he put his hand onto her head, or when he started to stroke her hair, but he did. When he had seen her on her knees, he had to admit he was punishing her for being Draco's mum; not for anything she had done to him. The thing was, he had started to see revenge as fun in some parts, but a way to make him dark in others. So he sat and played with her hair.

Narcissa's back hurt, and she had no idea why she had gone down on all fours to become a chair for her husband; other than the times Draco and her ex-husband used her back as a foot stool, she had never done that before. When he started to play with her hair, she had froze; slowly,  
the way he ran his fingers through her hair made her relax. It was something no one had done to her since her dad had died. She sighed; she would put up with things for awhile, and if it came to it, she would kill herself. As a slave, she had access to poison.

Harry chatted away and soon, they were all involved in discussions. At the end, Harry asked about his wife—well, slave, or whatever she was,  
and if it would be OK to take her with him. It had been a long discussion, as the Jokers were sad about anyone wanting to commit suicide.

After some talk, it was decided that she would go with him but none of the others; as he explained, she had many enemies, so it made sense, and when he said it was because Harry had been suicidal and knew where the slave came from, it might help a bit.

Harry decided it was time to go; he was starting to feel his form, and that meant he wouldn't be able to hold it much longer. "I feel Harry calling me," the elf said. "I must go; I shall give him all your correspondences and will hopefully see you soon." Then he stopped and looked like he was hearing something. "Is the slave's vow made so she cannot betray Harry? I think he's saying to make sure she's safe or something…it's hard to tell."

The adults soon had her make an Unbreakable Vow to not do anything to harm Harry or give away his whereabouts. As soon as Harry was happy, he left with her.

She sat, dazed, still on all fours and still with her husband resting on her back; this place was amazing. Harry smiled as the adults came back in. They took one look at Harry and his wife and shook their heads.

"She has a vow not to betray me, and not to betray where I am." Narcissa looked up at the elf as it started to morph into—shit, no way—Harry Potter was resting on her back and she was—oh, fuck. She passed out from the weight.

When she came round, she heard voices, and she knew they were talking about her. She thought about pretending to be asleep, but a small voice stopped that. She opened her eyes and saw a house elf next to her. The elf handed her a potion.

"Your husband wants you fit and strong before he sees to you," he said.

It was three days of potions and proper meals before Harry made an appearance. He had spent his time learning laws and other formal regulatory lessons along with his normal training and his flying. It was also time for Narcissa to get centered and used to the animals and people and, most importantly, the elves around her. Harry smiled at the women in front of him. OK, she was what a lot of older boys called a "hottie," but she was too uptight; plus, he was her second husband.

"It would seem that as I'm the last of the Potters, and now married, I am classed as an adult." Narcissa had a sinking feeling in her stomach.  
"Tonight we shall share a bed," he announced. He turned and left.

That day, she moved about a bit and did some small exercises that the elves and other adults there made her do. When it came to bedtime—well,  
more like when Harry was tired, he called her to his room. He lay in his pajamas and smiled at her. He had a phoenix, an owl, and some strange animal (if the others were to be believed, it was a Crumple-Horned Snorlack) surrounding him.

He pulled the blanket out of the way and motioned her into the bed. She got in and lay next to him; at first, neither did anything, but then he put his hand on her head, smiled, and went to sleep.

It took her several hours before she managed to go to sleep herself.  
When she awoke, he was snuggled up to her and she was to him; not so much as lovers, but more as a mother with a child who had been sick or frightened and come into his parents' bed to sleep better. He had a peaceful look about him, and it was nice to be cuddled, but she gently pulled herself away and got out of bed.

Narcissa went through to the main hall and Rita was there. She had always seen Rita as a jealous, acidic type of person, but here she laughed and joked.

"Morning!"

Narcissa looked at her. "Morning."

Rita smiled a little. "Did you sleep well? Is Harry up yet?" Narcissa shook her head. "I bet you want to know what's going on, sticking you two in the same bed, yes?" Rita asked. Narcissa just nodded. "It's simple," Rita explained. "Both of you have very negative ideas about other people; Harry came from an abusive home where he was beaten and starved and locked into a small cupboard. You were badly treated by your husband and son; you both need to know that not all people are like that." Rita smiled. "Also it's part of both your therapy, to help you both establish some level of trust between you."

A Joker appeared. "We thought that you both need each other and nearly on the same levels," it said. "Harry has gotten better since his marriages, but you are an unknown to him."

Her head shot up. "Marriages? I thought he was just married to me—or I was married to an elf."

The Joker laughed and Rita took pity on her. "Harry's married to his owl, Hedwig; his phoenix, Fawkes; and his Snorlack, Luna. Oh, and to make it better, one of his animagus forms is an elf, so it was him you married. Plus he's engaged to a Luna Lovegood."

Rita bust out laughing at Narcissa's face. "We call it the Harry moment,  
or Harry time, as we're bloody well sure no one has ever had this type of life."

Just then, Harry wandered in, looked at Narcissa, and spoke. "Your name is Cissy from now on," he declared. "I will not go round calling you 'Whore' or 'Slave'; you are my wife, so now it's Cissy. Remember that"  
He left and got a shower; when he came out, Cissy was still where he had last seen her.

Rita smiled at him. "Are we starting her healing today, then, Lover Boy?"

Harry smirked. "Yes, we shall; I think that we shall introduce her to her fellow wives in the proper manner as well."

Cissy was glad she had a name now instead of Slave or Whore; only her husband had been able to give her a name, but even so, she was still classed as lowest of the low.

"So, Husband, what is there to fix with me and you today?"

Harry looked down at her. "Today you see my childhood; then I see your life."

She sat back, shocked; she had expected Legilimency, not this weird hat thing. As she watched, her ideas of how spoilt he must have been were destroyed; her ideas that Dumbledore was a white wizard were destroyed;  
the idea that Harry Potter was all fame and no backbone was destroyed.

It took her five hours to sort through the memories. As she had felt each blow, heard each cry for help, she felt disgusted with herself. She had tried to kill herself for a bit of a sad life; her childhood was OK,  
though, she had had people who loved her. This child had no one, yet he still carried on fighting. Who the hell was she, a fully grown adult, a witch from a spoilt background, compared to the boy who would not quit?  
The boy who would do anything to protect everyone. She had never been so ashamed of herself. She had been ashamed for her behavior at times, but this was more. This was being ashamed of her fundamental ideas, this was soul-deep shame. Trying suicide after few weeks of harsh treatment was bad, but to endure years of it and still come back fighting…. Well, that was not something she understood, and the fact that he had two out of three Unforgivables used against him and had defeated He-Who—no, Tom bloody Riddle more times than anyone was staggering.

After a meal and a shower, it was Harry's turn. He went into her memories and saw her spoilt childhood, and how her life was fine till Lucius had been a Death Eater for a few months; but her life went back to fine the whole time she was pregnant. Everything was great till Draco turned eleven and went to Hogwarts. It was as if having his son and heir about calmed Lucius; Narcissa's life went truly bad when Lucius showed Draco the Unforgivables while he was high on some potion. Overall, she had gotten an easy life; when he felt her disgust at herself and her despair, he laughed.

"Geez, woman, is that all you had to put up with? Bloody hell, how I would love such an easy life," he thought to himself.

And she had to admit that he had a point. She could have hexed Lucius'  
balls off anytime she wanted; she could have called her sisters to do it, Bella would have jumped at the chance. It took several trips into both their memories for them to sort out the issues they had with each other.

Each night, they slept in the same bed, and over time, Harry would sit on her lap or better yet, sit between her legs and let her stroke his hair. She become something of a mother to him and he became like a son to her. He was attentive, kind, and considerate, but once when she annoyed him, she saw the fire in him and spent the rest of the day out of his sight. She had met many powerful people over the years, but the way he radiated it when he was pissed off was beyond belief for a child.  
He was nowhere near like Tom or Dumbledore, for whom she had no respect.  
But it was the fact that he was a child that made him so remarkable.  
Training intensified, and now Cissy trained along with the others.

Dumbledore was livid. It was September the first; all had gone well—till the time of sorting. Now it appeared that the hat was missing. On top of everything else, Lupin, Black, and Tonks (he called her Nymphadora, just to bug her; he thought it was cute) had burst in on the ceremony. But when Hagrid had called out the hat was missing, she had smiled and calmly said: "So, Albus, either you lost it or it's been stolen; an item made by the four founders, a priceless relic, and you either misplaced it or had it stolen from the second most protected place in England.  
Really, you should try harder." And he was sure she was laughing at him;  
if she wasn't, at least Lupin and Black were.

"See, Lupin, my old friend," Sirius said, "I wonder if it's worth looking at another school for Harry. Obviously this one has gone down hill."

Lupin looked at Black wryly. "Well, I don't know if it's the school or the staff; after all, in Harry's first year, Quirrell tried to kill him.  
In his second year, that idiot tried to remove Harry's and Ron's memories; then in his third year, why, I believe that was just last year, you broke into the school with no problems."

Dumbledore was furious. He had kept most details to himself and made sure he looked like more of a hero. Even if Potter wasn't here, he was getting on Dumbledore's nerves. "Well, I must admit I have had a lot to do," he said, "but I left Professor McGonagall in charge while I went looking for Harry."

The look the head of Gryffindor gave him let any semi-intelligent students know she wasn't happy. "Bugger this," she thought. "Yes,  
please, tell the students how your favorite student told you he was in an abusive home, and how YOU told all the staff YOU had looked into it and all he had were a couple of light slaps when he misbehaved. Also tell them how you dropped him off on their doorstep, leaving a one-year old baby undefended and walked off, never making sure he was found or hadn't rained." She took a breath just as the headmaster was about to speak, but Filius spoke up.

"Yes, please tell us how you left a baby on a doorstep and never once in ten years went to check on him. But you called yourself his guardian?  
Also explain why he never even knew when his birthday was till a teacher told him. Explain why you never sent your word—a card, or present, in ten years, and why his first Hogwarts letter was addressed the cupboard under the stairs."

The students blanched; some, like Harry's friends, looked daggers at the headmaster. Black looked at Lupin and smiled; they nodded in unison.  
"Professors," Sirius proclaimed, "it seems as though you forgot when Harry told you about Quirrell going for the Stone; you told him it was none of his business and if he hadn't gone after it, Voldemort would have been resurrected two years ago."

McGonagall blanched; she had never thought of it that way. She had trusted the headmaster that much and as she believe in him, had wavered only recently; she hadn't had a chance to fully understand her actions.  
"Quirrell was He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named?" she asked in a shaky voice.  
Black, Lupin, and Tonks burst out laughing.

"You mean old sacko there never told you?" Tonks asked. "Think about who would be evil enough to drink unicorn blood and still need the stone."

McGonagall turned to Dumbledore. "Quirrell was He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named.  
We sat at the table eating with the murderer of so many innocent people,  
and you never told us." Her voice was beyond anger, and it didn't help that all the other professors were raging mad as well; Madam Pomfrey was more so, as she now knew why Harry had such a crap first year. She spoke up:

"That's why he was so near death and magically drained; you had him fighting a fully grown adult, and if you include He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named, he was fighting two adults, both evil, by himself."

Few students (or even teachers, for that matter) saw her move, but they saw her fist hit his nose and they all heard it break. "You miserable bastard excuse for a eunuch!" She stormed off. The other teachers looked at him sourly and all left the table, bar the Heads of House. Black looked toward Albus and decided to twist the knife.

"So Albus, did you find Harry? We have his books and stuff here for him."

Dumbledore got up, looked around, tried the "hurt grandfather"  
expression with his eyes, and left.

"First year students," McGonagall said, "please don't worry; once we have the hat, you shall be sorted. Until it is found, if you have family or friends here, sit with them; the remaining students, place yourselves where you would like to go."

Lupin, Black, and Tonks went to the Head Table, nodded to Slughorn who they knew from their school days, and sat next to the angry head of Gryffindor.

"Harry's alive and OK," Lupin informed her. "Don't worry about that."

She smiled sadly. "I just hope he forgives an old woman who followed a fool blindly for so long." She shook her head. "How could he allow that monster in the castle? The wards would have said evil was in here."

Sirius shrugged. "He was turning Harry into a weapon, not a human." He smiled at her. "Oh, well, we shall see tomorrow if he's here, then. Bye now."

They left the hall, or were about to when a voice called out: "You know I would have thought you would have come and chatted to his fiancé a bit before you left, and let me know how he is."

They turned; a blonde in Ravenclaw was looking at them. She had Hermione sitting next to her, also giving them a look. They turned around and Sirius fixed her with a pointed gaze. "I am sorry. Harry said he may be a little late in coming to school; he got us to get him books for all courses, so I'm not sure what he's taking."

She looked at him critically and smiled. "You know, he has so many wives now, I wonder how he will find time for me." She shrugged, looking straight at Sirius. "I also wanted a virgin husband, but now he has had sex a few times; I suppose I shall have to make the most of his skills when I come of age."

Sirius' eyes went huge. Tonks spat her drink everywhere and Lupin collapsed onto the floor in an undignified manner.

"Well, you did marry him to Cissy—or do you still call her Slave?" Luna cocked her head to one side. "Oh well, he's happy, so that's good." She went back to talking to Hermione as if nothing had happened. The other Ravenclaws stared at her; in fact, most the hall was staring at her. One Ravenclaw spoke up.

"Hum, is she really engaged to Harry Potter?"

Sirius turned to the Ravenclaw and nodded. "She has put it in her petition and I granted it. When she and Harry meet, she will be given a promise ring."

Hermione looked up from her conversation and added, "I am getting one as well." She put her head down and played with her drink as Luna continued to talk. The hall doors opened and in came Draco, Ginny, and Ron; they were ushered to a table that seemed to come from nowhere.

Professor McGonagall spoke up. "Great bloody idiot left, and didn't even give the—"

The doors opened again and in came a group of students with a massive woman leading them. "Is this how the English greet their guests?" the woman boomed. "Leaving them outside. How uncouth."

McGonagall shook her head; bastard headmaster. "I am so sorry, Madame Maxine, but I assumed the headmaster had gone to greet you; as you can see, he is not at the tables." She turned to Professor Flitwick.  
"Filius, would you go see if the Durmstrang students are about? This really will not do." She motioned to the woman she had called Madame Maxine to come to the Head Table. "Please accept my and the school's apologies and join us for out meal. The headmaster hasn't told anyone why you are here yet, so I suppose something important has come up and he assumed I would do it; a bit of warning would have been—" She broke off suddenly as Dumbledore appeared.

"My sincere apologies, Madame Maxine, but I was called away for a few moments and—" he shrugged, "you know how it is running a school."

She nodded. "Yes, I do; it is why I have subordinates to give instructions to."

Dumbledore looked wounded, but those who knew him saw that he was annoyed. "Madame Maxine, if you follow our news, you know Harry Potter has vanished; I was following a—"

Sirius spoke up. "Oh, no you don't. We told you he would be late for school; don't try pinning this on him." Dumbledore looked daggers at him. Sirius just shrugged it off. "Come, Remus, it seems the headmaster's mind is going. Bye Luna, Hermione; Professors." With that,  
he, Tonks, and Remus left.

As soon as they had got out the hall door, they saw the Durmstrang students coming towards them. They moved out the way and nodded to Filius. Remus looked at Sirius.

"Why do I get the feeling this was set up before Harry went missing?"

Sirius nodded. "Moony, my old friend, I was just thinking that myself."

"Any idea why so many foreign people are here?"

Sirius paled. "He wouldn't."

Almost together, the pair said: "The Tri-Wizard Tournament."

Tonks looked blank; when Lupin explained it to her, she simply said: "He would."

They hurried off, hoping they could warn Harry.

In the Great Hall, Albus explained the Tri-Wizard Tournament to the students. He explained that Draco, Ginny, and Ron were here on a temporary stay away from prison. He hadn't wanted to cite some special need for them to be alone, but the twins had spoken up about it.

"Yes, bloody day release from prison."

Ron looked daggers at them. "I didn't go to prison," he snapped. "She did." He pointed to Ginny. "And he did." He pointed to Draco. "I am here because I won't abandon my family, unlike you tossers."

The twins grinned. "Oh, Ronnikins, I think we should show some of your dorm mates some photos—better yet, let's show Harry."

Ron exploded; between calling Harry and the twins names, he must have lost 600 house points total. The two heads from the other schools shook their heads, and so did many students.

Luna was out of her element; people were talking to her. Even the headmaster wanted to know if she knew where Harry was. Others wanted to make up with her for being mean, but it was Ginny who hurt her. She had known about Ginny and it had made no difference; now Ginny was cold to her, actively snubbing her, and she couldn't understand it. She thought Ginny would need a friend after where she had been. She had been mistaken; it seemed she was alone but for Hermione, Neville, and the twins, who seemed to like her. She sighed; soon, her love would come,  
and she could be herself.

The Headmaster looked out over the student body. He continued to drone on about the effects the Tournament would have on the school; most students only paid attention to how it would affect Quidditch. One of the twins' hands came up.

"Excuse me, what do you mean by that Quidditch comment?"

Dumbledore looked annoyed at the interruption and explained that it would be unfeasible to continue holding Quidditch matches with all the other stuff going on.

"Well," the twin said, "it seems Harry's right: you are losing it. Why not have inter-school matches and have a mixed school team as well?  
Victor Krum there is going pro, so by doing this, you are harming his career, and some of the students here are thinking of going pro as well.  
You really haven't thought this out, have you? It's so easy to clear a Quidditch field, or to do whatever you want to use that area for. Yeesh,  
you are so sad." With that, he sat down.

Karkaroff, the head of Durmstrang, stood and smiled. "That is a wonderful idea," he declared. "Inter-school games, so that our champions—when chosen—are not totally in the limelight. Everyone can share in some of the glory! This will even bring talent scouts to help aspiring players."

Harry and Cissy continued to interact; she had been surprised with his Multimagus skill, and she found it amusing that he seemed to be unaware of how much his body had changed as he had grown older, and the effect his eyes had on women. At first, they had been, well, at best tolerant of each other, until they saw each other's lives and started to speak.  
It had been a revelation to both of them, but to Cissy, it had been a totally humbling experience. She had come to realise that she was married to a man in a boy's body. Good food, a good woman, and exercise would soon sort that out.

She looked at Harry and Hedwig flying together after coupling and felt jealous. A voice beside he spoke. "There is no need to be jealous. If he gives his love, he gives all of it." She turned; Jester was next to her.

"He is a child," she said, "but more of an adult than anyone I have met.  
The responsibilities and burdens he carries should destroy him."

"Well, they nearly did," Jester said.

"He came out of it so strong and I got dragged into it," Cissy went on.  
"Now I find myself jealous of an owl, a phoenix, and a Snorlack."

She took on a dreamy appearance. "Hum…." As a wife, she had seen Harry mate with all his other wives, but his time with Luna had been an eye opener; she had left after a few hours and spent some alone time in their quarters. It had shocked her when she had woken up and gone looking for them to find them still at it. She had to admit that she had been more sexually frustrated than any other time in her life after five days of seeing how much Harry loved Luna. She also found herself peeking at Harry from time to time and blushing like a school girl with her first crush. Her, a twice-married women, ex-whore, ex-slave, a mother,  
found herself falling in love with a mere boy. She had no idea what to do, as neither of her marriages had been by her choice. She looked at Jester forlornly.

"I am human, I can't help it."

Jester laughed. "You're in love and don't know how to handle the emotions."

Cissy went red and was about to deny it, but shook her head instead. "I think I am. He is so kind, considerate, loving, giving…. It's not fair.  
By the animal standards, he is an adult, but all I can do is watch and"  
She stopped suddenly.

"Some quality finger time," supplied Jester. Cissy went beet red and started to stammer nonsense; Jester only laughed harder.

Harry had seen and heard a lot of their conversation in his owl form; he went over to them and landed on Cissy's shoulder. He tilted his head and nibbled her ear, then ran his beak along the edge of her ear. She decided this wasn't helping; when Hedwig landed on her other shoulder and started doing the same to her other ear, she went even redder.

"See? They both love you, Cissy," laughed Jester.

"Hedwig's a female! I-I-I-I—" She gave up, deflated. Harry took off and then shimmered as he transformed into his human form. His face was flushed and he had a glint in his oh-so-green eyes. His hand came up and pulled her down to a kneeling position; he looked her in the eyes and pulled her head to his to kiss her. She tried not to laugh, but that had to be the worst kiss she ever had; it was sloppy and he was trying too hard. She was sure she would have bruised lips, and—

She stopped herself to think through what she knew about him. This must be his first human kiss with a woman; he never had been shown how. He was kissing based on things he had overheard, conversations and bits on film. She pushed him away and shook her head. He got an angry look on his face, then quickly changed it to resignation. She smiled.

"Stay still," she said. "Close your eyes."

He felt her hands on his head, tilting it slightly; then he felt a cool breeze as she blew over his lips. Something wet made its way from his chin to his mouth; it snaked its way around his mouth. It took all his self control to keep from opening his eyes; even with all the freedom of body and mind he now had, some things were deeply ingrained in him and,  
to be honest, this felt nice. He felt a soft touch to his mouth and the wet thing started to make its way past his lips. He went ramrod straight as it clicked in his mind—bloody hell, it was Cissy's tongue! (He felt a typically male reaction.)

Cissy was enjoying it; she had teased him a bit and was now happily flicking her tongue around the inside of his mouth. It hit her suddenly that Harry was definitely male and, judging by the squirming, an uncomfortable one at that. She felt his hands come up towards her, then go back down, and she took pity on him. Without breaking contact with him, she put his hands on the back of her head and her lower back. She felt his surprisingly strong arms pull her closer and then she decided that when she had discovered he was all male, it had only been the tip of an iceberg. Oh, Morgana, wait till he finished growing; she went deep red just thinking about it. When they broke apart, they were both breathing heavily.

"Harry, that, I think, is the kiss you were going for." She smiled at him as he nodded so hard and fast that she was worried he would give himself a concussion. "Well," she went on, "let's begin your education on kissing, shall we?" His eyes went huge and he started to stagger as if he was drunk. She had to admit she was slightly light-headed herself;  
she looked down at herself. "Ohh Morgana," she mumbled.

She had him magic up a couple of chairs for them and started to explain things like how to hold a woman, where to touch one, and places women liked to be touched. He had been shocked to hear that her chest and her—he went bright red—womanly place were not the only places women liked to be touched. She smiled at him as he squirmed in his chair.

"Now, Harry, I will touch you, or do something to you. I want you to close your eyes and feel it, OK?"

He nodded. She doubted he had enough blood left in circulation to send oxygen to his brain and wondered if he needed a blood replenishing potion. She went over to him and licked around his ear lobe, then she sucked it into her mouth and teased it with her teeth and tongue. She let it out of her mouth and gently blew on it; he sat bolt upright as the hairs on his ears reacted to the breeze and he sighed. "OK, open your eyes. Now, do you remember how that felt?" He nodded as if his head had taken leave of his awareness. "Good," she said. "Now do it to me."

His eyes went wide, his face went white, and she couldn't help it; she started to laugh a true, deep laugh. Tears ran down her face and she couldn't help herself. She got up and left the room, laughing harder than she could ever remember. She managed to get Rita and Rebecca to come with her back to where she had left Harry.

Harry had been stunned; Cissy had burst out laughing for no reason and left. He felt betrayed and hurt, but confused more than anything. He was still sitting there in shock, absently stroking Hedwig when they came through the door. Rita and Rebecca were used to his expressions; they could see the hurt all on his face and they were not happy with a certain laughing blonde. "Ask him, ask him," was all Cissy managed to say before collapsing in laughter.

They turned to Harry. "Well, what's happened?"

Harry looked up, startled. "I-I-I-I kissed her, and she wasn't happy with it—then she made me close my eyes and," he got a dreamy look on his face and went pink, "she kissed me. She made me call up a couple of chairs and then told me…." It really was an interesting shade of red he could turn to. "Hum, anyway, she sucked on my ear then asked m-m-me to suck her ear!" He went brighter red and they looked at Cissy, then back at Harry.

"Did you suck on her ear, Harry?" They expected him to say yes, but he went white and shook his head. Cissy spoke:

"He is married and has sex regularly with his other wives; he has defeated Tommy boy several times; he has fought a Basilisk; and he was scared—" She broke down into giggles again and Rita and Rebecca suddenly had an insight as to what was going on in Cissy's head. They started to giggle too. Harry looked even more confused.

"Poor male," Rita sighed. "We shall have to help him." She sat next to him after expanding his chair into a loveseat. "Harry, think of this from Cissy's point of view. You're near to fearless in many respects;  
you have fought and killed some great evils, and you're married and regularly have sex in animagus form. You're a hero to many." He looked at her blankly. "Harry," Rita said patiently, "it struck Cissy as funny that you could fight a troll, fight Tommy, fight a Basilisk, but not kiss a woman's ear."

As soon as she spoke it aloud, Becca broke down into gales of laughter and Rita suddenly found it hard not to laugh as well.

"So she isn't making fun of me? Or teasing me?" came Harry's barely-there voice.

Rita shook her head and smiled. "No, Harry, she isn't, and wasn't;  
it's—well, think about it. A Basilisk's no problem, but kissing an ear?  
You nearly fainted."

Harry got a grin on his face as well and started to snigger; Rita joined him. It took awhile for them to get themselves under control. "Right,  
Cissy, I'm ready now to give it a try," he said finally.

Rita spoke up. "Well…I don't know. She nearly broke you last time; maybe you should try kissing someone else's ear first."

Cissy's face went blank but Harry's lit up. "OK, Rita, thanks for offering!" He turned to Cissy and smiled, then winked at her. "Right"  
he said to Rita, "first off, you have to kneel, Rita, so we're roughly the same height. Then you need to close your eyes." She did. "OK," he went on, "now I can show you what my teacher taught me."

Rita hadn't taken into account Harry's ability to learn when he wanted to, nor had Cissy taken into account his access to her memories. He held Rita's face lightly, then ran his tongue over her lips, nibbled her bottom lip, and licked and kissed his way to her ear. She had a flush to her face and Harry was soon digging into Rita without the aid of his hands. A gasp came from Rebecca and she mumbled, "He is impressive,  
isn't he." Rita's face was red as he made his way to her ear and started to lick and suck her earlobe; when he let her go, he blew gently along the length of her ear and pulled away.

"So, teacher, how was that?" He smirked at her. Rita, it seemed, hadn't realised the kiss had ended; either that or she had been hit by a stunning spell.

"We should ask my sister when she comes around, Harry," Rebecca laughed.  
"She seems to be slightly stunned. Harry, I can now see why you were a little shaken when asked to do that to Cissy."

Cissy smiled. "I think he has the general idea for that kiss now; I should show him some others."

Becca burst out laughing. "Do you think he would survive that?"

A soft moaning noise broke through their ears and they looked at Rita. A twin pair of grins broke out. "We could always have my sister practice with him," Rebecca said quietly. Rita slowly let the room come into focus.

"Morgana, what hit me?" She heard a giggle that quickly turned into a laugh, followed by several others.

"Harry kissed you, do you remember? Poor Sis, you look like you're in shock." They were all laughing again. Rita felt a small pair of hands hold her, then a little peck on her mouth.

"Come on, it's only my second attempt ever at kissing," Harry teased.  
"With more practice, I should get better."

Her brain went into overdrive; he would get better? Oh, Morgana, no wonder Cissy spent time alone in their room. She looked him in the face and smiled. "Maybe you should practice with Becky as well."

He stiffened. "No," he said firmly. "She is married, and Alan is my friend, and so is she. You are single and Cissy is my wife. Becky is beautiful, kind, and caring; Alan is—well, Alan's loyal, fun, and a friend. I will not betray that."

Rita nodded slowly. "Harry, love, I was joking just to see her reaction.  
We all three of us know you wouldn't do anything like that. Did you just call me beautiful? As Becky and I are identical twins."

They all laughed at his look of confusion. A male voice broke in: "So,  
poor Harry. Having all you lot ganging up on him. What's going on?" Alan laughed at hearing the day's events. "Harry, you can't practice with her, but I do believe Becky and I should do some practice; after all,  
this is a very important talent that needs to be used often." He smiled as Harry's face lit up. "So do we all watch you two practice, just in case you know some technique that would come in handy for me and my wife? Or would you like to practice in private?" He smirked. "After all,  
it seems my lessons became a group thing."

Rebecca sprayed her drink over Rita and Cissy was off again. Harry got up and started to wander about the room. "Rita, I think I should take you back." He held up his hand. "I need to know what's going on and your animagus ability allows that, plus it's time for school to start. I want to know what those tossers have planned for me this year." He smiled.  
"Yes, I think you should stay with Sirius; then you can go back to your place later and sort out your work."

She didn't want to go, but could see his point of view; so could the others. They needed intel and Rita was best for that. She changed into bug form and sat on his shoulder.

Sirius and company were sitting at lunch; Harry hadn't turned up that day, and they were all worried about this Tri-Wizard thing. "But there is an age line around it, and a detection spell to see if it's the same person written on the paper as the one who's holding it. Harry isn't here, so how can—" Remus stopped as Harry's elf friend popped in. Sirius sat stock-still.

"Am I to be pranked today, or is this something else?"

Harry smiled. "Not told to prank you today. Harry said old people's hearts can't take too much pranking." Remus smiled. "Harry wonders which one of you is older so he knows who to prank less."

Sirius spoke up. "I am much older than Remus and Tonks, so I suppose I should be pranked less." He smiled at both the aforementioned people.  
"As Tonks is the youngest and needs the training, maybe she should be number one on the prank wars list." Tonks gave him a death glare.  
"What's this visit about, then, my good friend?" Sirius went on,  
ignoring her.

The elf conjured a chair and sat down. " Intel. Harry needs it, so he sent a friend who he trusts. Is this place safe from ears and eyes?" A few wand swishes later, it was. "Have you ever heard of a reporter named Rita Skeeter?" They all nodded. "OK, see, she's one of Harry's friends"  
He took something from his shoulder and placed it in front of Sirius.  
Poor Sirius saw the bug and moved closer to have a better look when it transformed; he found his face parked between a pair of bum cheeks. Rita didn't notice straight away.

"Harry, did you have to put me on the—" She stopped and slowly turned her head to look behind herself. Remus, Tonks, and Harry broke down laughing; Sirius tried to push back but only managed to tip his chair over.

"It's lucky I told her to get dressed first, I think," Harry said.  
"Remus, what do you say?" Remus couldn't answer him for laughing. Quite unnecessarily, Harry continued: "Rita here is an unregistered animagus.  
Sirius, Remus, Tonks, say hi."

Rita looked at the man who had, moments before, been parked between her bum cheeks, went slightly red and went for attack. "You know, if you want to do that, it's much better if I'm naked." Bugger, that was not the attack she had in mind, but this fellow was tall, dark, and he seemed to be—well, just seemed to be.

"Rita Skeeter, are you the same one who sent us the message about the prophecy?" Rita turned to Remus and nodded. "Good," he said, nodding.  
"We would like to thank you, and I bet Harry would as well."

Rita giggled. "Harry has enough women to thank for different things, and he has thanked me already." The adults, including a now-recovered Sirius (who was offering her his arm), stopped moving.

"You have seen my Harry?" asked the bloke holding out his hand. She tilted her head to one side and smiled.

"Does that make you Padfoot? Sirius Black?"

He smiled and nodded. "The 'Do Not Throw Away' still sticks in my mind from your letter."

"Oh boy, no wonder you were getting so much mail." She blushed, then Harry spoke up.

"I have to go, and it seems Rita has a crush on you, Sirius. Don't hurt her." He tilted his head to one side. "Unless she is into that sort of thing, of course." Then a soft pop, and he was gone, leaving a blushing Rita and Sirius and a howling Tonks and Remus in his wake.

Alan was doing some work for Harry; it had taken awhile, but it seemed Alan had an aptitude for potions, and once things were explained to him,  
he could see his way around a potion and how it all worked. Rita had told him it was like cooking, so Rebecca had said not to let him try as he burnt water, let alone anything else. He had been slow on the uptake,  
but he decided it was like a car engine; each piece had to be perfect and each bit worked with another to make the whole engine, or in this case, the whole potion. He found it easy to see a simple healing potion from ingredients after he worked on his own agonies. His main complaint had been using quills and ink, as he said a pen was so much better, and he preferred paper instead of scrolls. That was, until Harry explained it to him:

"I was the same as you, Alan," he had said. "Then I worked it out; the ink is from giant squids and mushrooms, like the ink cap. The quills are feathers from different birds; both can be replaced with no harm to the environment. A pen and ink has to be manufactured and anything manufactured hits the environment hard; plastics and stuff use some nasty process whereas with a quill, it's plucked or found, so no harm done.

"The scrolls are papyrus and other things, basically reed rush and stuff mixed together to make a parchment. This is also renewable and by harvesting rushes and the such, they keep waterways clear; that really is a better option than pen and ink for the environment. Remember,  
wizards and witches live with nature more than muggles."

It had been a hard lesson to learn to write with a quill, but now he seemed to prefer it. One of the elves had shown him how to trim a nib and he was surprised when Harry sat in with him on his writing lessons.

"Alan, I might as well be muggle born," he had explained. "I have no idea how to write neatly with a quill, and Hogwarts hasn't given me lessons on calligraphy. Learning is never wasted unless the person being taught wastes it."

Speak of the devil; Harry popped up behind him. "Well, I have dropped Rita off and I think she and Sirius are going to hit it off. How's the potion coming?"

Alan looked back at him. "I'm not to sure our potions teacher thinks they're OK, but…." Alan shrugged his shoulders. "You check it out"  
Harry went over to one they had been working on for awhile. He noticed the colour was not quite right and was about to say something when it exploded; the next thing he knew, he had elephant ears and a long trunk for a nose. Alan, Rebecca, and Cissy were all laughing at him.

"So, Mister I-will-prank-everyone, how's it feel to be pranked?" Alan asked between bouts of laughter.

Harry shook his head. "Oh, foolish mortals…you will learn." The potions elf popped up and looked from Alan to Harry and back. "See?" he said. "I told you it needed less time." He cocked his head to one side. "Hum, I wonder how long it lasts for? Oh well, clean this place up. This isn't a joke shop." He popped away.

It was the second day at Hogwarts and everyone was on edge; Harry still had not turned up and Luna had found that she had friends all of a sudden. Hermione had been pestered by other Gryffindors and some from Ravenclaw. She had been surprised in a free period by one from Durmstrang, a Victor Krum. He had been surprised that she had no idea who he was and had only approached her as he needed help looking for a book on shields. He had been further surprised when the adoration and starry-eyed gazing he was normally greeted with was missing and he could have a conversation without all the fawning. Sirius had enjoyed the breakfast at Hogwarts, but not as much as he had with his new girlfriend—Rita.

He had been shocked when Rita had appeared in front of him, and pleasantly surprised. She seemed to be a natural practical joker, what with her animagus ability. She had volunteered to spy on Dumbledore for them.

One surprise had been Luna when she had seen Rita in bug form, taken her away from the headmaster's cloak, and sat down. Most had thought her crazy, humming to the bug and talking to it. "Now, little buggy, you should not pester the headmaster; he has all sorts of spells on him and in his room and you might get zapped."

Albus smiled his grandfatherly smile at her. "I assume you have anti-insect spells in your office, sir, so your instruments and papers do not get ruined?"

He nodded. "It's is nice to see you value life so much that you even save an insect." And off he walked. She smiled and continued to hum.  
Rita was glad of what she had overheard, and after awhile, when everyone had, left Luna spoke again. "Have you seen my fiancé recently? Well, if I were you, I would sit near the door or on the window sill, maybe. I would listen in on what people say after leaving his office. Oh, well,  
off you go, little bug." And off she went, humming again.

The next few days were basically the same, until the fifth day.

Harry looked up at the chamberlain. "So, my friend, tomorrow I go home.  
Do you think I am ready?"

The chamberlain smiled at him. "The better question would be, are they ready for you?" And he started to snigger. Harry shook his head.

"Well, I have some elf magic and found out what traits carry over to my human form from my animagus forms, so I suppose all that's left is to go—" He stopped and shook his head. " I was going say 'home,' but I have no home. Well, I do, but not places that feel like home. Except here"  
He sighed. "I have my family homes and that, plus an open invention to Black's place, but they say 'home is where the heart is,' and here feels like home."

The chamberlain nodded kindly. "That's nice to know, my friend. Now,  
let's see what mischief you have ready." Before long, both were laughing.

Harry awoke and said his goodbyes to the elves and the Jokers. He flew with the phoenixes and then went to Rebecca and Alan's room.

"You two up and ready to leave?" he asked. After a tearful goodbye, they transported to Albania. As Harry, Pheone, and Dobby did the transporting, and they had one adult each, there was no real problem.  
After Alan and Becky were comfortable in a small hotel for the night,  
they explained that they had been touring the country and wanted to get to some airport on the morrow. The got in touch with their workplaces and told them they would be in the following week. They had Harry and Dobby pop them all over during the day so they could take snapshots for holiday snaps to show coworkers, and tried a few different meals but never finished one.

Harry visited the magical areas and even picked up a few good books.  
Well, he assumed they were good, after he did a translate spell on them.  
Overall, Harry liked the place, except for the glum atmosphere. He left Becky and Alan and went back to England. He got to London and after a quick glamour spell, went to the Leaky Cauldron; from there he went to Diagon Alley. Once he got there, he went shopping for odd things, like a new broom, some nice clothes, and even paid a visit to the Weasley's Wizard Wheezes shop and bought a few things. He left the bank and places he supposed he would go normally, but did go to the Owl Emporium and got all sorts of treats. When he was finished shopping, Harry found where Sirius was and went to meet him.

A man opened the door and snuck in. He ran a quick check for ward or other unfriendly spells and entered. He did an elaborate time spell and saw he had three hours before Harry would arrive. He smiled to himself and set to work.

Hedwig, under an invisibility cloak, watched the silly man setting traps to catch her man and smiled. When she felt Harry was close, she sent him her love and showed him the simple traps that had been set.

Harry smirked and set to thinking. He went up to the door, still under a glamour charm, and knocked.

Inside the room, Sirius did a quick disillusionment charm on himself and hid in the shadows, waiting. Harry knocked again; still no answer. He rattled the door as if it was locked and said in a reasonably loud voice that Sirius must be running late, and he would sit outside till he turned up. Inside, Sirius swore; he was sure he had left the door open.  
He then made his first mistake: He tried to Apparate out of the room.

His trap set for Apparition was activated and when he appeared before Harry, he was nude with bright pink hair. Harry jumped, startled, as a nude, pink-haired man appeared before him and as anyone with a wand would do, he stunned him and tied him up; at the last moment, he conjured some clothes for him. This did not work terribly well, and Sirius now had multi-hues hair and a flashing "Marauders Rule" sign above his head. Harry sent a message with his Patronus to the only Auror he knew, one Nymphadora Tonks, saying he had gone to meet with Sirius and some strange bloke had appeared, and he had stunned him.

Tonks and Remus appeared seconds after he had sent his message and just burst out laughing. Harry acted confused.

"Care to explain what's so funny, you two?"

"That's—that's—" was as far as Tonks got, but Harry acted as if he caught on. He freed Sirius as Remus went into the house; unfortunately for him, when he cast a light charm to see better, he got splattered with pies; when Tonks came in carrying Sirius (who was still woozy) and saw this, she banished some of the pies.

"No!" Sirius wailed, but it was to late. Harry stepped outside and let all of Sirius' pranks hit him, Tonks, and Remus; when the noise finally died down, he came back.

The place was a mess, and three smelly, oddly colour-changing lumps—presumably people—were lying in a huddle on the floor. "Hum, what happened here?" How such an innocent question was deserving of the language and the spells that came his way, he was sure he had no idea.

He sent Hedwig back to Atlantis with a message of how things were going his first day back. It was strange; since he and Hedwig had bred, he found he could use his elf talents of sending packages to different places. He supposed it came from a house elf's ability to send shopping parcels home for their masters. Either way, it was bloody handy. Some two hours later, Remus, Tonks, and Sirius exited the house.

"It would seem as though you had a surprise set up for me, dear godfather," Harry said, chuckling. "Maybe you should not have gone for the overkill on the pranks. But that's just my humble opinion." They were not happy; Harry decided to take pity on them. "So how does my slur campaign against Voldemort go?"

Remus and Sirius looked up and smiled true smiles at him. "About that,  
my young Marauder. It seems as though a few people went to doctors and such and found it highly unlikely that they will have children, or more children, as the case may be; the pure bloods are very upset about this and, well, let's say it's not contained to one country."

Harry smiled back. "So do I pass the Marauder entry exam, then?"

Tonks snorted a laugh. "If you don't, then I think you could set up an anti-Marauder team." She was cut off as Remus kissed her; Harry's smile turned slightly dirty.

"Ooh, what a—"

"You're in, you're in!" Sirius interrupted.

They sat at their own little table in the Great Hall. Everyone had heard about them, and most avoided them, but Luna had shocked them when she came over; even more, Ginny's attitude shocked the whole school. Many came up to Luna and talked to her as a way to get to Harry, but any who had thought of talking to the fifth house, or the House of Traitors, as it was being called, changed their minds against the idea.

Draco hated it; he wanted to talk to someone normal, even if it was only to Crabbe or Goyle. Ginny set his teeth on edge, Ron was not a person he had ever or would ever like. Black was smiling again and laughing with that cow, Tonks, and the fur ball, Lupin. He hated them all; why couldn't he have his nice, comfy life back? The answer was two words:  
Harry Potter.

Dumbledore sat down at the Head Table. Great, that was all he needed;  
couldn't they at least show some decorum? No, they had to laugh and joke with the Weasley twins; ever since they had became partners in a new shop, the Triple M (Marauders Magnificent Mayhem, as it was called), it had become even worse. Now there was an owl delivery discount to Gryffindor Quidditch players whereas Slytherin was charged extra. To make it worse, they had erected a billboard stating that if any team from Hogwarts beat Slytherin, that team and their family would get a 25%  
discount for the duration of the Tri-Wizard Tournament. It was not looking good for Slytherin.

"Albus, my friend," Sirius said. "Any sign of Harry?"

Dumbledore was about to shake his head when the school wards started to act funny; they seemed to be telling him that friends were coming. He smiled. "I think he has arrived."

Sirius, Remus, Tonks looked at Dumbledore. A smile crept over Sirius's face. "Harry's here?"

Dumbledore nodded. "I think there is a high probability."

They all heard the heavy tread of someone coming towards the main doors.  
Stomp, stomp, stomp; the doors opened slowly and in walked….

"Hello, hello! Who wants to be sorted? All you have to do is sit me on your head!"

Half the first years fainted; the others crowded together in a corner and whimpered. The golem stepped to one side and Harry entered with Hedwig on one shoulder, Fawkes on the other, and a third, strange animal wrapped around his neck. To say he had changed was an understatement; he stood three inches taller than he had been when he had left the school and instead of school robes, he wore jeans and a tight t-shirt. He had muscles, his hair was tied back in a ponytail, and he was wearing designer glasses. He walked as if he owned everything; not in a snotty way like Malfoy, but confident in himself. His gaze took in the whole room and many of the older students noticed his green eyes glow, not only with power but some undefined emotion. The professors and some more of the world-wise recognised it as simple confidence and supreme knowledge of one's own power. There was no trace of self-doubt or lack of worth.

He looked round and saw his godfather and some strangers up on the centre podium. A big smile lit his face; it seemed impossible, but he looked like a young child. Even if he was actually young, to many he had always seemed old; now he looked like he should. He ran as fast as he could towards Sirius, a human missile to knock him flying.

"Is it true?" he asked. "You're free?"

Sirius laughed. "You go missing and no one can find you! I am sitting in the middle of hundreds of students and you ask me if I free."

Remus shook with silent laughter and Tonks spoke up. "Hello, Auror here;  
you think I would sit this close to an escaped villain and not arrest him on the spot?" She looked him over. "So, Lover Boy, where you been?"

Harry smiled. "I had to make sure it wasn't a dream. I really have family now?"

Remus sighed and Sirius looked uncertain. "Yes, Harry; you no longer need to go to the Dursley's. I am now your legal magical and muggle guardian."

"Way to go, me!" Harry started to do a happy dance. Most of the school started laughing, but the headmaster and some of the other professors were not among them. Harry stopped dancing and looked at Dumbledore.  
"Sorry I'm late, I had a delayed flight. So, Professor McGonagall, how is my school year planned this year?" he asked innocently. "Some nutter trying kill me? Or maybe some Dark Lord wanting me dead? Or could we have a change and just have standard lessons, please?" His naïvely wide-eyed face didn't fool anyone.

The other heads looked at this strange kid and tried to work out how what they had heard about Harry Potter might click with who was in front of them. Harry looked at the massive woman and the dark man beside her.  
"So, Godfather, who are these people, then?"

Dumbledore spoke up before Sirius had a chance. "Harry, why are you showing so much disrespect? And what does that golem mean, it is the Sorting Hat?"

Harry glowered at the headmaster. "You put me through Hell," he seethed.  
"I will answer you when I think you are worthy of my attention, old man,  
and not before then." He turned to Professor McGonagall. "Now,  
Professor, who are these people and what's going on?"

McGonagall smiled briefly, then put on her stern face. "That is no way to speak to the headmaster, Mister Potter. These are the headmaster and headmistress of Durmstrang and Beauxbatons Schools of Magic."

Harry got a big grin on his face. "Cool! So is this some foreign exchange program where we learn of other schools and cultures? Or is it some plot to get me killed?"

A gasp echoed around the hall. Several teachers and students had smirks on their faces; Harry stood up and helped his godfather up as well.  
"Would all Death Eaters and people planning to kill me please line up so I can just kill you now and have a normal year?"

More gasps rang out around the hall and for the first time, Harry noticed that Snape was missing. "OK, the Death Eater Snape is not here,  
so there, one down. I suppose the new Defense Against the Dark Arts teacher is one, as all but Lupin here have been Voldemort's followers."

A grizzled man stood up, one of his eye wildly roving all over the place. "I'm your new Defense teacher," he said gruffly, "and no one calls Mad-Eye Moody a Death Eater and gets away with it. Especially not some snot-nosed brat, you hear?"

Harry smiled at him. "OK, so I've gotta kick your arse, then; any more Death Eaters here?"

Moody moved up behind Potter and drew his wand; he suddenly crossed his eyes as he fell to the floor, clutching himself between his legs. "One down, any more takers?"

The students all gasped. "How the hell did you do that, Harry?"

Harry laughed and pointed to his hands in his pockets with a fake arm.  
"Fake arms and disillusionment charms on real ones."

The old Marauders burst out laughing. "So, snot-nosed kid," Sirius said,  
"what are you planning then? The old goat has a point." He said pointing to the golem.

Harry smiled. "Well, the hat helped me sort out some problems, and I asked him what he would like. He said more mobility, so with a bit of work and some help…. Voil, a golem. He is mobile and my debt is paid off, and of course, I am a Marauder, so it's not a simple golem; go on,  
Hatty, show them."

The golem's face lit up as it lifted an arm and pointed to the sorting stool "Wingardium Leviosa," the golem said. The stool never moved. A voice called out:

"It's 'Win-/gar/-dium Levi-/o/-sa!"

Harry looked around. "Hi, hottie," he said flirtatiously, "any idea where Hermione is?" He winked at her; Hermione went red and pointed to herself. "Ooh," Harry said, "nice change." Then he stopped. "Why aren't you sitting next to Ron? Why are they separate from the others?" There was a clearing of throats and some shifty looks around the room.

"You, I remember you." Harry swung round and pointed at Rita. "I saw you in Albania at some nightclub or other. You had a couple of blokes on your arms and you were just about legless." He smiled. "Mind you, I saw you weren't legless when you did your table dancing."

Sirius burst out laughing; Rita hid her face and several others just stared at Rita and Harry.

"Wingardium Leviosa!"

Everyone turned to the golem as a light shot from his hand; the sorting stool moved over to him and settled down. Everyone looked shocked, but Harry just smiled.

"Wand cores in his arms," he said. "Aren't I so cool?"

The silence was palpable. Then, it started; first from the Marauders,  
then from others in the hall: clapping and stomping of feet. It seemed his return was welcome. Harry smiled and waved to everyone.

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Thanks to beta Lanie McCoy 


	10. Chapter 10

I do not own anthing you know from the canon, the rest is mine ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

The Future -----------------

The voices came to him as if from a distance. "So the smeghead says,  
'Destroy the female statues first,' does he, well, sod him! I'm going to…." He heard no further; the voice had made it into his conscious.  
Someone was going to attack the others. He shifted his form and became human.

"I do not think you will harm anything here," he said. "I would advise you to leave." The tone was cold and sent shivers down one of the men.

"Oi! Rod! We got another wand-waver here." The man reached into his pocket and pulled out a weird-looking device. A smile crept over his face. "Now what're you going to do without your stick?" He started to laugh and his friends grinned; then there was nothing. Whatever it was that might have stopped a wand was no match for a Basilisk's stare; they fell to the floor, dead.

"My wives, it is time to awaken; it seems Hogwarts is under attack, or has been defeated." The statues shimmered; Hermione, Fawkes, Cissy,  
Luna, Luna, Myrtle, Hedwig, and Blaze. One by one, the sleep fell from them. "We are to war once more." A confident Harry Potter left the Chamber of Secrets and made his way around the castle, reading the minds of the invaders.

It seemed wizards and witches had been betrayed; the secret was out and there were witch hunts going on again. Hogwarts had fallen when the latest headmaster had given in to save his students. Here and there on the walls were words like some mad graffiti artist had been along. Luna looked at them critically.

"When stone is man and man is stone, Hogwarts' fall shall never be known…. When all is dark, the light shall appear…. Wizards of good, your hero shall appear…. Take note of this and all will be well; he shall stand and defeat all ne'er-do-wells." She turned to Harry. "Seems like you're expected, my love. Shall we make our introductions to the world?"

Harry sighed. "As one man once said, onward and upward."

They found people in the headmaster's study; they shocked them and kicked them out of Hogwarts, along with the dead bodies littering the room. They tried to put up wards, but they were pushed back each time.

"Potty Potter, look to the lake!" came a distance voice. Harry looked towards it and saw what he assumed was the lake. It smelt awful and there were many dead things floating in it. He hoped it wasn't the merfolk, but, his resolve settled, he headed towards it. He tried afflicting it with lightning, snow, sleet, and all manner of spells, but none seemed to work.

Luna looked at it and smiled sagely. "Maybe a simple solution, my love"  
She walked over to it and pushed a button. Harry felt magical energy start to flow around him.

"The off button." He smiled. "I should have thought of that." He turned and at the edge of the forest, he saw people come out, herding and whipping others. His face went grim. Unknown wards appeared around him and the people being whipped started chanting. Harry moved forward, his cloak doing a passing imitation of Snape's.

The muggles, or whatever they were, looked on in shock as a strange man and several women and strange animals came towards them. They tried to throw up protection against the wand-wavers and magical creatures; sadly for them, it didn't stop the Basilisk that appeared before them. They fell to the floor, dead.

The wizards and witches stopped chanting as soon as the first overseer fell. They knew if the new thing, whoever (or whatever) it was, lost,  
they would be punished, but any chance to be free was worth it. Luna continued to dismantle the small boxes and smiled to her husband. He changed back to human form.

"Welcome to Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry," he announced.  
"I am Harry Potter and these lovely ladies are my wives." The wards shot up around the place and the once-slaves felt sharp surges of hope.

"Harry Potter, Harry Potter," they murmured over and over. They all looked to him.

"Dobby, awaken! Pheone, awaken!" His voice held pure and simple power.  
Two elves popped into existence at his call. "We shall restart Hogwarts,  
my friends; let us enter and catch up."

So began Harry's second war, 75 years after his first. His army was small to start off, but people and creatures heard he was back and smuggled themselves into Hogwarts. His own children turned up and soon the muggles and wizards had an uneasy truce; many died on both sides.

Harry and his wives (including a couple of new ones) went back to sleep.  
Every so often, he awoke to fight, and slept again. His family and his knowledge grew.

A long time later, he awoke again. This wasn't Hogwarts; there was too much metal. Children were singing; he looked around and found that his wives were not present.

"Are you ready for your trip to Oxy-Moronicus?"

The children yelled that they were. Harry skimmed the speaker's mind and found that it was shielded somehow; he saw a small box on his person and tried to summon it.

Again he failed, so taking a leaf from Luna's book, he hit the bloke over the head from behind. There were gasps from the children and who he presumed to be their teacher. He removed the box and entered the man's unconscious mind. New worlds, travelling the stars; a world where technology wouldn't work past a certain stage. Slave labour of children with a version of the bubble-head charm to work in the mines.

"Where are the other statues from Hogwarts?" he asked.

A teacher stuttered, "There, and there." She pointed to other vessels.

"Why did you hit him, mister?" came from a small pale boy with unruly hair.

Harry laughed as he saw the boy's green eyes. "You are one of my descendents, I think. You look so much like me when I was younger."

The teacher stared at her pupil, then at the man. "Harry Potter?" she said in a small voice. "You only show up when…."

She looked at the unconscious guard and paled. "We are at war and never knew it." With her help and the children's, and using the old Trojan horse trick, Harry soon liberated all the other ships and got some of his wives back. The children had watched in awe as heroes and heroines came to life in front of them.

A child gave a pad to Hermione, and a set of learning plugs. "Here,  
Miss, it's our lessons; you will want to learn a bit of history and new spells."

Hermione grinned and sat down as she started to learn. The new war didn't last long and wasn't hard, though as it seemed the government and some large companies had merged for the purposes of the fight. The general public made a huge outcry and soon, new people were in power and many more were in jail. It wasn't bloodless but far fewer died than in any of Harry's previous wars.

He stood and looked over what was once the finest school of magic in the world. There was barely a whisper of power now, and even he found it hard to stand. The ghosts seemed to be gone; the lake was dry, and the forest was smoking. Of all the times he had awoken, this was the hardest. It seemed others from another world had met mankind's kindness and they had retaliated hard. He had met with the enemy and had fought;  
his wives were hidden, as they were too weak to awaken yet. He noticed a human in the middle of what was left of the Forbidden Forest and realised it was a ghost.

The enemy commander walked up behind Harry and spoke. "We have decided."

Harry turned around and looked at the being. He had his guards and ships, but he looked small and scared when he had seen the damage this one human had done. He remembered how he had laughed when one human slave had spoken about the saviour coming, and how the Stardragon would awaken. He had stopped laughing when an iridescent dragon with crystal wings had actually appeared and destroyed thirty attack ships in a few blinks of a crow's eye. When the dragon had shimmered and disappeared,  
and this human had appeared on his deck, the commander had felt fear.

"We will talk or you will be destroyed," was all the human had said before he vanished. The dragon reappeared and flew to the planet below.

It hadn't taken much talking before they all had got together. The flight leaders had laughed until they saw a replay. They had taken one week to decide. During that time, there had been some fighting; they had told the solders to stop, but looters and other bad elements hadn't,  
although as some had their homes and loved ones destroyed, no one felt too bad about it. That was, until they had attacked this place. It was where the Stardragon called home and it hadn't been pretty. Few would have memories of it as few had survived. Half a fleet was destroyed. The rest were grounded or late to get to there. When he had appeared after the attack, the only surviving person in command had asked why.

"You attached my home," was the answer. When they had seen his home before and after, as he projected it directly into their minds, they shook. "It was a school," he said. "One of the best. It has been my home for longer than anyone would think."

He had left and the enemy had decided to speak with one of the old ones.  
They had awoken him from his slumber and quelled before his anger at what they had allowed to happen, after the cease fire. Now they stood behind him and as he turned to them, they hoped to Jester that they could stop it and have peace.

"We will help rebuild your home and your world," the commander said. "We were told that a multi-type government would be best; a coalition of worlds."

The human's sniggers turned into a barking laugh. "A united federation of planets, maybe?"

They looked at him, stunned. "Yes, yes of course, that's it; an excellent name for us." They looked at each other and back to him.  
"Would you be willing to join?"

Harry looked back at them and they got a sense of his tiredness. "I am a warrior," he said. "A killer, a fighter. I know little of peace. My home is gone; I think it's time for me to move."

One spoke up. "Where will you move to? I-I-I am sure we could help, if you need it."

Harry looked at him and smiled. "Thanks for the offer, but I don't think you could go where I'm going; Atlantis isn't all that easy to get to"  
He saw several go bug-eyed and others make strange signs over themselves.

"Wh-who /are/ you?" stuttered the leader.

"I am Harry James Potter," Harry said boldly. "Heir to Gryffindor,  
guardian of Hogwarts and Atlantis. Friend to elves and Jokers!" He had to stop as most of them were disoriented now and others were being violently sick. He looked apologetic. "Sorry to shout, but when someone asks who I am…some idiot cursed me and I always shout it. As most know me, I rarely get asked, so I just forgot."

One of the more able commanders vanished as he touched his transporter chip; he returned with the ancient one. Harry looked at the thing in the dome he held; it swirled and coalesced, and swirled again. "Who are you?" he asked. "What are you? Why do you seem so familiar?"

The being spoke. "I was injured a long time ago. I have been travelling since I heard the news of one who could feed us. I am a Joker, the father of Jester."

Harry's eyes widened. "Expecto Patronum!" The silver mist hit the casing and the Joker inside started to change form; soon the casing fell apart.

"I am leaving Earth," Harry said finally. "I am going to Atlantis; your son is there. Would you care to join us?"

None of the enemy remained standing when Harry looked around. "What's with them?" he asked.

"It was their holy mission to try and save me," Jester's father explained. "When news came of you, we left straight away; it hasn't been an easy journey. When your kind met us at an outpost, we were attacked.  
The rest you know. They attacked and destroyed the home of the one there. They are in shock; some may even die."

It took awhile, but soon all the issues had been settled or designated to other people. Harry was so tired that he nearly forgot the ghost, but as he was about to go, a drape fluttered and he remembered. He appeared in roughly the right area and started to look about.

"Potter! Ten points from Gryffindor for sloppy Apparition." The voice was not slimy as it used to be, and the sneer seemed forced.

"Severus," Harry said with fond derision. "How thoroughly you." He sat down and pointed to the end of the log; Snape sat down as well. "It has been a long time, my old nemesis, hasn't it?"

Snape nodded. "The magic is about worn out of the Forest, the lake,  
everything. Hogwarts is gone; soon, so shall I be, once I have said my piece." Harry looked at him closely. If a ghost could look ill, tired,  
and fed up with everything, then that was what his old potions master looked like now.

"It was you who gave the prophecies and advice to the man in black, the spectral guardian," Harry said, suddenly understanding. "How many names have you used over the years?"

"Twenty points to Gryffindor," Snape shot back. "You finally managed to use your brain; it only took you…." He looked about and laughed. "So long I forget how many centuries it took."

Harry laughed. "Um, does this mean I might be in need of a special needs class? I seem to be a bit slow at learning."

This was too much for Snape and he nearly lost his form. "I think even Longbottom wouldn't take this long." He sighed. "I have much to tell you before I can go to my rest."

"Do you want to rest?" Harry asked. "Or would you like to teach or study again?"

Snape cocked an eyebrow at him. "I am leaving," Harry explained. "Do you remember when I vanished the first time? I am going there. Would you like to come as well?"

Snape frowned. "Why?"

Harry looked him in the eyes. "Because," he said. "Simply because."

Snape shook his head. "Still you have the habit of annoying me," he said. "I had thought that…well, it's no mind."

Harry smiled. "We are both from long ago, and neither knows the other. I have heard of you using various names to protect Hogwarts and you must have heard of my little fights every so often."

Snape laughed. "Little fights? Forty near-world wars, countless internal wars, and now an intergalactic one. If these are little fights, I would hate to see a big one."

Harry shrugged. "Don't I get points for modesty?" And he bust out laughing; Snape tried to glare but couldn't manage it.

Jester appeared before them. "We are ready," he said, and he vanished.  
Snape looked at Harry.

"It would take time to get to know each other," he said thoughtfully. "I could just say what I want to say to you, but…. Oh, hell, come on,  
Potter; let's set the universe on edge. Snape and Potter. If you can move me, I'm sick of this place, and I want to see everything."

The enemy came upon them and bowed. "Sir, we are so sorry we destroyed your home. We didn't know." He went to hit himself and Harry s eyes lit up.

"Elves, you're related to the elves," he said excitedly. Snape stared at him.

"What are you on about? You mean these are related to house elves?"

The enemy shook his head and frowned. "We, we don't know what you mean."

Harry grinned. "Dobby, Dobby!" he called. The elf in question popped into place, saw Snape, and hissed.

"Thought the greasy one would leave Harry Potter alo—" He stopped abruptly and stared at the enemy, who stared back at him.

"An ancestor," the enemy breathed. "A living ancestor."

Harry smiled at Snape. "See?"

"Twenty points from Gryffindor for having a big head."

The enemy and Dobby turned to Harry and spoke almost as one: "It is time for us to come home."

Harry's smile softened. "Yes, my friends, it is time." He waved his hands and the forest was gone; Hogwarts remained, but all the grounds were gone. Snape was a bit surprised; Dumbledore couldn't have done it so casually.

"Do you remember when I went missing, Snape? Well, you are about to see where I went." Harry put his hand into his pocket and vanished, and Snape saw him reappear a ways away. He put the stone, or whatever it was, down and popped back to Snape. He grinned and pointed at the thing.  
"Engorgio!"

Atlantis appeared before them.

Beings and creatures started to pour out; all were extinct, or had only been myths and rumours from before Harry even was born. Snape saw the city, the animals, then the people: Granger, Lovegood, and a few others—Narcissa, Myrtle. What the hell was Myrtle doing there? She was a ghost—but she wasn't, at least not anymore. Snape looked at Harry as a golem came out and stretched its massive arms. They all walked over to him; elves were appearing all over the place and the enemy was in tears.  
Many landed their crafts or transported down only to faint or die of shock on the spot.

The Jokers came out last. They all looked well. Each time Harry had awoken, he had fed them, and he had fed them again before he slept.

"So, Snape," Harry said, "you want to leave this place and see everything, then so be it." Harry made some motions with his hand and Snape felt something tugging at him; he felt suddenly solid but not really solid. It was a most strange sensation. It took awhile, but he found he could walk further than he had gone since his death.

"I see I owe you again, Potter," Snape said begrudgingly. "Well, OK then; ten points to Gryffindor for…this." He waved his hand about.

The golem spoke: "Now, see, Harry, I told you that you would do truly great things if you had been in Slytherin. Now you only get ten points"  
The golem chuckled as Snape goggled at it.

"The Sorting Hat? You're the bloody Sorting Hat! What—why—how—" Snape managed to feel faint.

"Hmm, I sort of adopted him," Harry explained. "Or maybe he adopted me.  
He came to me when I was ill the first time I vanished. He comes here every so often to see how the school fairs without him; he was even Headmaster for awhile."

The hat laughed. "Happy days."

Snape looked between Harry and the hat. "What do you mean, he should have gone to Slytherin?"

There followed the story of how Harry had already met Malfoy and how he had befriended Ron on the first train to Hogwarts, and how the hat had wanted him to be Slytherin but as he hated Malfoy, he asked to go somewhere else. Snape laughed.

"I, as Head of Slytherin, hereby make you an honorary Slytherin and award you three million points for all this."

Harry smiled cheekily. "How come when I was Gryffindor, I only got ten points?"

Snape laughed again. "Well, you see, I might favour my own house a little bit." They both broke out in laughter.

As time went on, Harry would sleep every so often, but for the most part, he and Snape and Harry s wives travelled the universe and became known as Defenders of the Light. Snape even married an alien who could become incorporeal so they could touch each other. They eventually became an intergalactic police force: Harry, his wives, and Snape, plus the hat.

They all had happy and sad memories, like the time the Earth's sun went nova. They didn't know if they were all immortal or not, but they had a laugh about it as Snape once said: "If Tommy boy wanted immortality, all he had to do was be your wife, or your friend, and do good."

This had caused a bit of an argument when it was pointed out by Harry's thirty-six wives that he didn't play that field (much), but they were sure Tommy boy could have been good friends with Snape. The stories and legends continued to grow; some were to be told, some may never be known. Who knows what the future holds?

As you can see, some of the future is good and some old wounds are mended. This isn't the end of their story, however, but another beginning. How did they get this far, even? Well, that is another story for another time. Thank you for reading.

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Thanks to beta Lanie McCoy 


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